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1 

3. — 


FLORENCE  PAST  AND  PRESENT 


FLORENCE 

PAST    AND    PRESENT 


BY 


The    Rev.    J.    WOOD    BROWN,    M.A. 

AUTHOR    OF    '  THK    HUII.DHRS   OF    FLORENXE' 


WITH   MAPS  AXD   ILLUSTRATIONS 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES   SCRIBNER'S  SONS 

153-157  FIFTH  AVENUE 

19  I  I 


FILIAE 

AMATISSIMAE 

UNICAE 

QUOD 

HASCE    PAGINAS 

DOCTIS    PERCURRENS    SIGLA    DIGITIS 

AD    PRELUM    CONCINNAVIT 

GRATO    ANIMO 

DEDICAT 

PATER 


555971 

TTAUAN 


PREFACE 

This  and  the  following  pages  are  to  stand  between 
the  Title  and  the  Book  itself;  they  may  well  be 
used  to  explain  the  one  by  w^ay  of  preparing  for  the 
other.  Now,  in  a  word,  the  '  Past  and  Present ' 
here  are  not  two  but  one  thing.  To  have  spoken 
of  the  latent  past,  to  have  called  the  present  its 
vehicle,  had  more  nearly  expressed  what  we  are  to 
seek  and  find  in  the  following  chapters.  Let  me 
make  place  here  for  two  examples  of  what  I  mean. 

Ten  years  ago,  in  the  heat  of  a  Tuscan  summer,  I 
made  one  of  a  party  that  drove  to  see  a  famous 
park.  The  villa  belonging  to  it,  we  found,  was  not 
shown  ;  it  was  then,  and  is  now,  the  residence  of  a 
man  of  great  title,  but  insane,  for  whom  it  had  been 
chosen  as  a  residence  at  once  suitable  to  his  high 
rank,  and  remote  enough  to  give  him  the  quiet 
retreat  his  state  requires. 

Our  guide  to  the  beauties  of  the  place  was  very 
willing  to  speak  of  the  invalid,  nor  is  there  now  any 
reason  why  I  should  not  repeat  what  I  then  heard. 
One  of  the  principal  Italian  newspapers  has  just 
told  the  story  of  this  madness  without  making  any 


viii  Florence  Past  and  Present 

mystery  of  the  name  and  residence  of  the  sufferer.^ 
This  recent  report,  in  its  agreement  with  that  given 
to  me,  may  be  taken  to  show  that  here  is  no  passing 
freak  of  a  disordered  brain,  but  something  which  has 
become  a  recurrent  and  established  habit  under  the 
madness  that  has  provoked  it.  Let  us  come  to  the 
reputed  facts  of  the  case. 

The  sufferer  has  fits  of  restlessness  which  repeat 
themselves  every  few  weeks.  At  these  times  his 
attendants  humour  his  wish  to  be  alone,  but  still 
keep  him  under  observation  in  his  wanderings 
among  the  trees  of  the  park.  As  they  thus  watch 
unseen,  what  they  see  is  strange  enough.  Their 
charge  seats  himself  on  the  ground  and  seeks  for 
stones.  If  he  does  not  find  what  he  wants — for  he 
is  particular  in  the  choice — he  will  chip  one  pebble 
on  another  till  he  has  got  what  suits  his  purpose. 
Then,  holding  a  stone  in  each  hand,  and  using  quick 
strokes  of  edge  upon  edge,  he  accomplishes  with 
incredible  dexterity  the  trimming  of  his  beard  and 
hair. 

I  am  told  that  many  of  the  most  exact  thinkers  in 
science  deny  the  transmission  of  acquired  habits  by 
sheer  inheritance  from  father  to  son.  Still  less,  one 
sees,  would  they  then  allow  that  such  an  inheritance 
could  lie  dormant  through  countless  generations  to 
revive  at  last  in  a  remc^te  descendant.  Yet  it  might 
be   difficult   to   explain    this   story  unless    in   a  way 

^   Corricre  dclla  Sera,  Milan,  4lh  June  1910. 


Preface  ix 

involving  that  scientific  heresy.  Was  it  invented? 
Was  a  mere  tale  twice  told  at  an  interval  of  ten 
years  so  as  to  tally  in  all  important  particulars? 
Hardly. 

What  have  we  then  ?  Surely  it  was  thus  that 
men  worked  stones  and  used  them  in  the  prehistoric 
past.  The  particular  present  might  be  explained 
were  we  free  to  suppose  that  insanity  had  here 
discovered  and  developed  inherited  brain  impres- 
sions connecting  with  his  countless  ancestors  of  the 
Stone  Age  the  late  scion  of  one  of  the  most  ultra- 
civilised  European  stocks. 

To  me  at  any  rate  this  story,  which  I  cannot  but 
believe,  has  been  a  revelation  of  the  present  as  a 
possible  vehicle  of  the  remotest  past.  As  such  it 
not  only  illustrates  the  title  I  have  chosen  for  this 
book,  but  has  been  in  a  ver}'  real  way  a  determinant 
of  my  thought  in  producing  it. 

Take  another  example — and  it  shall  be  one  which 
involves  less  disputable  elements.  In  the  beginnings 
of  Italian  commercial  life,  long  before  our  era 
opened,  the  first  figure  impressed  on  Italian  coinage 
was  one  which  is  variously  interpreted  as  the  back- 
bone of  a  fish,  or  the  branch  of  a  tree  with  its  twigs. 
This  is  found  on  the  earliest  examples  of  the  ors 
sigjiatinn,  and  Professor  Pais  has,  with  much  plausi- 
bility, supposed  it  the  canting  sign  of  Spina  ;  that 
northern  emporium  of  trade  set  in  the  marshes  by 
the  mouth  of  the  Po  and  busy  with  ships  in  the  days 


X  Florence  Past  and  Present 

when  Italy  and  Greece  were  bound  by  commercial 
relations  which  made  them  effectively  one  from  the 
Alps  and  the  Balkans  to  Sicily  and  Crete. ^ 

Now  go  to  Naples  and  come  into  touch  with  the 
Camorra.  You  have  only  to  hire  a  cab  there,  and  a 
hundred  to  one  some  percentage  of  what  you  pay 
will  pass  into  the  hands  of  the  contabilc  of  the  great 
secret  society.  This  officer,  like  all  in  charge  of  the 
Camorra,  wears  a  distinctive  sign  of  his  office 
tattooed  on  his  arm.-  It  is  the  present  we  are 
dealing  with,  remember  :  vouched  for  by  the  blood 
that  flowed  when  the  mark  was  pricked  and 
pounced  ;  the  blood  that  beats  under  it  still. 
Yet  the  mark  is  the  old  sign  of  the  spina,  the 
branch  with  its  twigs  ;  used  in  the  old  sense 
too,  for  it  distinguishes  the  man  who  takes  the 
money  and  keeps  the  accounts.  By  what  succes- 
sion has  this  hieroglyph  found  its  way  from  the 
times  of  its  first  invention  to  our  own?  We  cannot 
tell  in  this  case  an\'  more  than  in  the  last  ;  in 
this  as  in  the  other  it  is  as  if  intervening  ages  had 
simply  disappeared,  for  what  lies  latent  in  the  facts 
of  the  present  is  the  remote  past  of  forgotten  time. 

So  then  from  the  following  chapters  the  whole 
Florentine  Middle  Age  will  be  found  to  drop  out. 
Here  there  will   be   no   question   of  the   rise   of  the 

^   E.    Pais,    '  L'Origine  dcgli   Klnisclii,'  \n  S/iidii  S/orici,  W.  pp.  49- 
87^(I'i.sa,  1893). 

-  See  article  in  I. a  Lcttiira  (.Milan,   1907),  p.  J09. 


Preface  xi 

Commune,  the  progress  of  the  Arti.  or  the  splendid, 
fateful  days  of  the  Medici.  Such  periods  and 
movements  have  emploj'ed  other  and  abler  pens, 
and  the  great  picture  the\'  compose  must  be  sought 
elsewhere,  for  this  book  makes  no  pretence  to 
furnish  anything,  in  its  '  Past  and  Present,'  but  the 
frame  to  that  masterpiece.  Its  writer  feels  happy 
in  the  thought  that  many  a  man  who  cannot  paint  a 
picture  may  yet  help  to  make  the  frame  for  it.  The 
reader,  if  here  and  there  he  be  tempted  to  condemn 
details  as  trivial,  and  to  call  fanciful  the  use  made  of 
them,  may  remember  that  it  is  just  this  kind  of 
work — the  commonest  material  in  a  fanciful  design 
— which  makes  a  frame  truly  Florentine. 

Florentine  or  not,  the  frame  must  fit ;  the  picture 
cannot  be  forgotten  by  the  framemaker,  even  though 
it  is  not  his  business  to  meddle  directly  with  it. 
Now,  leaving  the  figure,  this  is  as  much  as  to  say 
that  the  great  period  of  Florence  cannot  even  here 
be  altogether  neglected  ;  it  is  in  time  the  middle 
term,  and  in  effect  the  touchstone  of  truth,  as  regards 
the  '  Past  and  Present '  of  this  book.  May  I  point 
out  then  a  crucial  case  in  which  this  test  speaks  in 
favour  of  the  following  chapters?  They  will  show 
that  it  was  not  left  for  the  days  of  a  Christianity 
already  corrupt  to  pretend  for  the  first  time  a  debt 
of  Florence  to  Rome  rather  than  to  Greece  ;  that 
the  Church  in  thus  reversing  the  truth  by  her  tradi- 
tion only  continued  what  had  been  the  polic)'  of  the 


xii  Florence  Past  and  Present 

'  Urbs'  from  pagan  days,  and  that  in  reality  Florence 
was  Greek  rather  than  Roman  ;  Greek  from  the  first 
and  Greek  still  in  her  essential  spirit.  Thus  the 
wonder  of  her  greatest  movement — the  Renaissance 
— gains  new  meaning  in  this  new  setting.  The 
passion  for  Greek  in  the  fifteenth  century,  the 
sudden  success  of  such  study,  these  were  not  so 
much  a  'new  birth  '  as  an  awakening  in  which  the 
city  arose  to  the  memory  of  her  own  past.  Or,  if  we 
still  keep  the  word  that  has  become  classic,  this  was 
a  birth  that  proved  on  the  grand  scale  how  much 
may  lie  latent  in  man  through  dark  ages  and  yet 
surely  pass  to  future  generations  to  find  in  them  the 
moment  of  its  new  appearance. 

I  cannot  close  this  preface  better  than  by  a  word 
of  heartfelt  thanks  to  all  who  have  helped  me  in  my 
difficult  work.  To  name  them  separately  is  impos- 
sible, but  I  must  mention  with  special  gratitude  the 
librarian  of  the  Biblioteca  Marucelliana,  Cav.  A. 
Bruschi,  whose  kindness  has  been  unwearied  as  his 
skill  is  invaluable,  and  the  authorities  of  the  Biblio- 
teca Nazionale,  who,  with  great  courtesy,  have  given 
me  special  facilities  in  their  splendid  establishment. 
To  the  keepers  of  the  .Xrcha-ological  Museum  in  Via 
Colonna,  to  Cav.  G.  Carocci  of  the  Museo  di  S. 
Marco,  and  Cav.  C.  Nardini  of  the  l^iblioteca  Ric- 
cardiana,  I  would  also  express  my  warmest  thanks. 
Nor  must  I  forget  the  kindness  of  relatives  and  of 
personal    friends — especially  Mr.  Walter  Ashburner 


Preface  xiii 

— who  have  been  good  enough  to  read  my  book  in 
typescript  and  proof,  and  to  improve  it  materially 
by  the  corrections  and  suggestions  they  have  made. 
Comm.  V.  Alinari  and  Sig.  V.  Jacquier  of  Florence 
have  also  a  claim  on  the  gratitude  of  my  readers  as 
well  as  on  mine  ;  the\'  have  most  kindly  allowed  the 
reproduction  of  the  two  excellent  photographs  which 
appear  at  pages  iii  and  321, 

16  CoRso  Regina  Elena, 
Florence,  15///  October  1910. 


CONTENTS 
PART    I 

THE    LIVING    PAST 

CHAP. 

I.  The  Val  d'Arno,      ..... 

Structure  of  the  Apennine — which  rivers  follow.  Vol- 
canic upheaval  :  how  responsible  for  course  of  lower 
Arno.  Water  and  wood  make  fishers  and  hunters — a 
scattered  population,  which  grows  fast,  and  seeks  anew 
outlet. 

II.   F"ooD  AND  Magic,       ..... 

How  hunting  trains  to  abstinence — which  survives  in 
Florentine  habit  of  parsimony.  Value  of  the  chestnut 
and  persistence  of  the  taste  for  this  simple  food. 
Modern  superstitions  a  survival  of  the  magic  of  the 
woods — derived  from  the  hunter's  peculiar  skill.  The 
were -wolf. 

III.   Early  Trade,  ..... 

Ti)e  great  change — how  it  came  about — on  the  borders 
and  then  inland.  The  horse  as  an  instrument  of  trade — 
with  the  road  as  a  consequence.  The  river  as  a  deter- 
minant of  the  trade  routes.  The  fisher  as  a  partner  in 
the  venture.  The  Golfolina  and  Gnone  attract  trade 
and  the  road.  Foreign  traders  drawn  hither.  Evidence 
of  their  presence  in  the  Val  d'Arno,  alike  in  deposits 
and  surviving  place-names. 


xvi  Florence  Past  and  Present 

CHAl'.  PAGE 

IV.  Thk  Site  and  its  Power,   ....  57 

Trade  encourages  common  life  in  village  and  city. 
The  sinking  lake  and  rising  deposits  of  Arno  and  Mug- 
none  provide  a  site — how  favourable  to  trade — traces  of 
early  occupation.  Exact  position  of  first  settlement. 
How  the  main  roads  fell  in  here.  iVltafronte  the 
original  centre. 

V.  The  Double  Inheritance,  ....  84 

The  Florentines  were  traders  who  had  been  hunters. 
The  woodland  family — how  it  appears  in  the  local 
building-form — and  in  proverbs  regarding  youth  and 
age — and  in  language  generally.  The  Tuscan  tongue 
prepared  in  the  woods,  and  developed  and  sharpened 
Ijy  trade.     The Jriszo. 

VI.  The  Ville  and  their  Reliciox,    ...  97 

The  new  life  of  the  trader — how  it  brought  as  a 
necessary  consequence  the  Matriarchate.  Independ- 
ence of  the  women — reaction — and  consequent  develop- 
ment of  manufactures.  First  culture  of  the  ground — 
obliges  community  to  divide.  New  kind  and  value  of 
property.  Arnina  and  Camarte.  Survivals — of  primi- 
tive manufactures — of  the  original  division  of  lands 
between  these  villages.  The  east  and  the  west  line  in 
Florence.  The  compila  where  this  meets  the  trade 
routes.  Human  rights,  and  religion  as  their  ultimate 
sanction.  The  goddess  and  the  god  at  the  two  cross- 
ways.  The  genicidiim,  and  what  it  meant — Janus— the 
beating  of  the  bounds.  The  stone  of  San  Tommaso— 
pillar  and  tree — the  sacred  marriage. 

VII.  TiiR  Development  ok  Fi.ORENtE,    .  .  .  126 

The  boundary  line  becomes  a  road,  and  directs  growth 
of  city  from  Mercatino  to  Mercato.  The  Etruscans — 
at  Fiesole — -How  trade  developed  under  their  rule. 
Mming  for  copper — felling  of  wood  —wider  agriculture 
— engineering  —draining— bridge  building  —  hydiaulics 
at  Florence.  Centre  of  city  moves  west  at  the  coming 
of  wheeled  traffic  on  the  roads.  Decunianus  and  Cardo, 
Decline  of  Etruscan  and  rise  of  Roman  power. 


A 


Contents  xvii 


PART    II 

MATERIAL   SURVIVALS 

CHAP.  PAGE 

VIII.  Boats  and  Boatmen,  ....  157 

The  building  of  the  l)oat — its  parts  and  their  names. 
Sand  gathering  by  boat  and  on  the  bank — conditions  of 
the  industry — its  antiquity.  Fishing — different  nets — 
how  worked.  Fishing  by  night — kinds  of  fish.  The 
fisherman's  gourd — different  uses — how  he  forms  it. 
This  art  very  old — older  than  pottery  itself. 

IX.  The  River  Trade,    .....  190 

Traced  back — from  i860 — to  gondohis  of  Grand  Duke 
— to  transport  of  Column  of  Justice.  Boats  of  fifteenth 
century — Cathedral  marbles  brought  by  river.  Freedom 
of  Arno  secured  bylaw  — Norman  pirates  at  Florence — 
Gothic  legislation — Roman  water-routes  in  Tuscany. 
Reason  of  decline  to  present  state.  Remaining  trade 
of  lower  Arno.  Limite  and  its  building-yards.  Trans- 
port of  timber  on  Arno — the  life  of  the  raftsmen — 
primitive  wood -trade.  The  raft  as  the  origin  of  the 
boat — its  development  at  the  ferry — and  in  the  bridge. 

X.  On  the  Road,  .....  232 

Florentine  carts— studied  in  the  detail  of  their  parts  and 
material.  The  team  as  a  survival  of  earlier  conditions 
— harness  and  trimming  of  the  cart  —  beasts  of  burden— 
the  barrel  derives  from  the  same  past — and  helps  to 
shape  the  cart. 

XI.  Amulets,  ......       258 

Ornaments  of  the  harness  —the  '  eye '  as  an  amulet — 
gives  meaning  to  the  whole.  Fascination  and  ways  of 
defeating  it — by  brightness — intricacy — and  sound. 
Theory  of  magic  transference.  How  this  fear  and  these 
amulets  alike  point  to  a  woodland  past.  The  corbezzolo 
as  a  charm. 


xviii  Florence  Past  and  Present 


PART    III 


THE   FEASTS 

CHAP.  PAGE 

XII.  Ceppo  and  Befana,  .....  285 

Vule-log  — antiquity  of  rite — ceppo  in  Greece — covers 
twelve  days  of  danger.  Tiie  Callicantzaros,  were-wolf 
and  vampire.  Fire  the  remedy.  The  Roman  Compi- 
talia — at  Florence — nay  Roman  only  under  Tuscan 
teaching.  Mania — perhaps  Egyptian — Demeter  of 
Phigalia — how  the  horse  comes  in — the  centaurs  of  the 
Tuscan  Eryx.  The  infernal  Diana — Befana — the 
equivalent  of  Mania.  Noise  in  Greece  and  Italy  as  a 
defence.  Masking.  The  bean  as  a  means  of  imitative 
and  protective  magic.  Witchcraft.  Imitative  magic 
borrowed  from  hunter  through  ceremonies  of  initiation 
and  totemisni. 


XIII.   Mid-Lent  and  Easter,        ....  314 

Day  of 'ladders'  at  Florence.  Full  form  of  rite — and 
its  meaning.  Spring  equinox  probably  the  true  date  of 
this  rite  and  of  the  Easter  Fire.  The  fire-ceremony  in 
its  present  form — tradition  of  origin — at  simplest  a  fall 
of  fire  by  gravity  from  pyre  to  pyre.  Fire  by  per- 
cussion and  friction.  Fire  in  the  tree.  Decumanus  a 
sun-line.  Needs  of  season.  Fire-birds — the  dove  of 
Florence  one  of  them.  The  mother-goddess  as  Cybele 
— the  boundary.  Stretched  cord  points  to  ceremony  in 
which  division  by  Decumanus  was  repeated  ritually 
every  year.  Name-day  of  Florence.  Mother-goddess  as 
the  Arna  of  Arnina — and  as  Fortuna.  Cyprian  and 
Sicilian  rites.  Conjunction  of  goddess  and  god — 
harvest  cakes  and  hopes  of  harvest. 


Contents  xix 


CHAP. 


XIV.  The  Grillo  and  Midsummer,       .  .  .  352 

The  Cascine  on  Ascension  day — mystic  meaning  of  the 
grillo — connection  with  solstice.  Feast  of  Saa  Gio- 
vanni described — correspondence  with  Greek  Kronia. 
.  The  Baptist  as  a  representative  of  Helios.  Day  of 
Fortune  at  Rome.  Kronos  becomes  Sosipolis  at  Elis. 
The  Fortune  of  the  Roman  Janiculum.  The  goddess 
of  Crete  and  of  Fiesole — lives  in  Santa  Verdiana. 
Hercules  stands  behind  '  St.  John.'  Seal  of  Florence 
— and  Marzocco.  Hercules,  Fortune  and  Mars. 
Baptistery  and  its  Gnomon.  The  eastern  Bacchus 
represents  the  secret  sun — supposed  to  rise  in  water. 
The  Nile  and  its  lotus — the  giglio  of  Florence — ritual 
bathing  in  river.  The  horse-race  on  the  Decumanus 
confirms  the  meaning  of  the  feast. 

XV.  The  Feast  of  September,  .  .  .  39S 

Fierucolone  described — the  ancient  fair — older  than  the 
Feast  of  the  Virgin's  birthday.  Probability  of  a  feast 
at  or  near  Equinox — a  feast  of  the  seed-time — with 
Demeter  and  Dionysus  as  the  goddess  and  the  god. 
Proofs — the  Coiiata  of  Naples — correspondence  with 
greater  Eleusinia.  Janus  the  Genius  of  Florence — here 
obviously  Consivus — the  eastern  Bacchus.  Ritual 
marriage  at  Eleusis — at  Florence,  in  San  Piero.  Hint 
of  its  meaning  in  Antella  coin.  Doctrine  must  touch 
state  of  dead— did  so  in  Greece,  at  Eleusis.  Seen 
at  Florence  by  early  tombs — but  above  all  in  floral 
crowns  used  at  Bishop's  '  marriage ' — and  in  Rifi- 
colone.  Double  fire  in  tree— transferred  to  'bride- 
groom.'    The  truth  that  lay  behind  the  rite. 

Index,  .......  431 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 

The  Arno  near  the  Madonnone,  ....    Frontispiece 

PAGE 

Rock  and  river  at  the  Golfolina,        ....  7 

In  the  Tuscan  woodland, 12 

Near  Borgunto  ;  the  Girone  road  rising  to  the  pass,  48 

Etruscan  wall  of  Fiesole  akove  Borgunto,        .        .  54 

The  plain  that  was  a  lake  ;  seen  fro.m  Bellosguardo,  60 

Borgunto  and  Mugnone  valley;  Etruscan  pavement 

IN  foreground, 61 

Gorge  of  Mugnone  above  Badia  di  Fiesole,       .         .  65 

Florence,  with  hill  of  .'^.  Giorgio,  seen  from  Bellos- 
guardo,           68 

Piazza  dei  Peruzzi  ;  curve  of  amphitheatre  on  right,  74 

Piazza    dell'  Arno  ;    seen    across   river   on   line  of 

ancient  ferry,    ........  79 

Mercato  Vecchio   and   Pillar  of   Abundance 

(Photo,  by  Alinari), Ill 

Mercato  Nuovo  ;  north-west  corner,  with  lemonade 

stall,    ..........  147 

Sand-pits  near  Varlungo, 163 

Piaggiaiuoli  at  work  under  Lung'  Arno  Vespucci,  .  165 


xxii  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Barcaiuolo  likting  a  scoopful  of  sand, 
Boats  at  work  under  Ponte  Sospeso,  . 
Fisherman's  house,  wrrn  giacchio  hung  out  to  dry 

BlLAXCIA   at  a  balcony  IN  BORGO  SaN  JaCOPO, 

Engraving  done  by  hand  on  a  wine-gourd. 

Fisherman's  gourd  lined  with  pitch,  . 

Earthenware  jar  glazed  within,  .... 

Arno  bank,  with  boats,  near  the  1'ignone, 

Ancient  will  on  the  Arno  at  Rovezzano,  . 

Cargo-boat  in  the  Medicean  port,  Pisa, 

Tower    of    the    Frescobaldi    on     the    Arno, 
near  montelupo, 

The  pool  at  Limite,  with  newly  launched  craft, 


In  the  yard  of  the  Fratelli   Picciiio 

THEiV-jTi-oF  Rovezzano,. 

The  Tuscan  cart;  a  wayside  halt, 

a  cart-horse  at  rest, 

At  Galluzzo  ;  a  cart  in  the  making, 

A  Tuscan  saddle,      .... 

Carters  and  their  team, 

A  I'AiR  OK  OXEN  ;  Siena  iskeed, 

Mule-tassels  and  bell,    . 

The  wise  wives  of  Tuscany,    . 

The  cimaruta 


PTi  AT  Limite 


PAGE 

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167 
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175 
184 
186 
187 
191 
194 
199 

203 
207 
209 
229 
233 
235 
238 
246 
247 
251 
259 
263 
270 


List  of  Illustrations  xxiii 

I'AGE 

Figurine  from  S.  Giovanni  ai.i.a  Vena 

(In  the  background  an  ancient  clay  toy  of  the  same  type 

from  Cyprus), 297 

Bells,  whistle,  and  trumpet  of  glass  used  on  night 

OF  Befana, 303 

Easter-car  in  its  house  on  the  Prato,        .        .        .  319 

The  fire-rite  of  Easter  Saturday  (Photo,  by  Jacquier),  321 

The  wings  of  the  ass  of  Empoli, 325 

Country  prockssion,  with  axgioletto,  entering  Signa,  333 

Procession    from    Pieve    crosses    Piazza    of    Signa  ; 

fortune-teller  and  her  table  in  foreground,  .         336 

Trees,  natural  and  ritual,  at  Madonna  del  Sasso,  340 

Stone  of  Madonna  in  sanctuary  altar,       .        .         .  341 

Florentine  Easter-cakes  ;  eggs  in  baskets,  and  dove,  350 

The  Oak  of  the  Cascine  in  its  three  generations,  352 

The   Cascine  on  Ascension  Day  ;    crickets   for  sale 

IN  cages, 353 

Cai;!':  for  a  cricket  in  buckwhkat  stem  ;  traditional 

form,     ..........         356 

Rustic  restaurants  of  the  Cascine  on  Ascension  Day,        357 

Coin  of  Thezli  with  serpent-goddess 

(By  kind  permission  of  the  Delegates  of  the  Clarendon 
Press),     ..........  369 

Lion  from  the  cippus  of  San  Tommaso 

(Kindly  photographed   for   this   book   by   the   experts  of 

the  Museo  Archeologico,  Florence),  ....  375 


xxiv  Florence  Past  and  Present 


PAGE 


S.  Verdiana,  as  she  appears  on  her  house  at  Castel- 

FIORENTINO, 379 

GiGLIO  FROM  LIN  PEL  OK  RiGATTIERI  IN  MUSEO  DI  S.  MaRCO,  389 

Tree  from  which  crickets  are  sold  on  Ascension  Day,  395 

Pai'fr  lanterns  from  Fierucolone  of  1910,         .        .  399 

Piazza  of   S.    Piero,   with    portico  of  church 

(The  arch  on  the  left  leads  to  Borgo  Pinti),       .          .          .  404 

Ilex  and  sacred  well  near  Monte  Murlo,         .         .  425 

MAPS 

I.  The  Val  d'Arno  as  it  once  w^as,    ....  8-9 

11.  The  Trade  Routes,    . 44-5 

III.   Florence  in  her  Elements 76-7 


Note.  — Except  those  oiherwise  specified,  all  the  above 
illustrations  are  from  photographs  taken  by  the  author. 
The  three  maps  have  also  been  reproduced  from  his  drawings. 


I 

THE  LIVING  PAST 


A 


CHAPTER  I 

THE   VAL   D'ARNO 

Two  great  elements,  the  one  natural,  the  other 
more  or  less  artificial,  have  gone  to  the  making  of 
Florence :  the  river  and  the  road.  Of  these  the 
former  is  the  more  important,  as  it  distinguishes  the 
capital  of  Tuscany  from  the  neighbouring  cities, 
and  has  given  it  a  permanent  and  prevailing 
advantage  over  these.  With  the  river,  therefore, 
we  begin,  asking  how  the  Arno  came  to  flow  as  it 
does  in  its  lower  course,  and  thus  to  determine 
here  the  site,  the  being,  and  the  prosperity  of 
Florence. 

Everywhere  water  is  the  constant  sculptor  of 
the  valley  in  which  it  moves,  but  to  move  at  all  it 
must  find  the  falling  gradient  which  the  mountain 
supplies.  Its  course  to  the  sea  will  thus  depend, 
one  sees,  on  the  direction  already  given  by  nature 
to  the  main  lines  of  the  land  which  it  drains.  Thus 
the  problem  of  the  Arno  at  Florence  can  only 
be  attacked  in  a  reference  to  the  structure  of  the 
Tuscan  Apennine. 


4  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Any  good  relief  map  of  the  country  will  show  at 
a  glance  that  the  main  ridges  of  these  hills  are 
laid  obliquely  ;  running  from  north-west  to  south- 
east. We  should  thus  expect  to  find  the  rivers 
flowing  in  the  same  direction  ;  as  following  this 
general  trend  and  confined  to  it  by  these  impassable 
boundaries.  In  a  measure  it  is  so;  the  upper  Magra 
and  Serchio,  the  Sieve  too,  still  obey  this  natural 
rule,  as  does  the  Tiber  throughout  its  course.  It  is 
the  same  with  the  Arno  so  long  as  it  flows  in  the 
Casentino,  but  under  Arezzo  a  sudden  change  affects 
the  stream.  It  sweeps  round  to  the  right,  almost 
exactly  reversing  its  earlier  course,  and  runs  north- 
west, past  Montevarchi  and  Figline,  to  Pontassieve. 
Here  it  turns  again,  now  to  the  left,  and  commences 
that  general  westward  flow  which  brings  it  at  last 
to  Pisa  and  the  sea.  Now  it  is  here  that  Florence 
lies,  on  the  westward-running  Arno,  and  the  being 
of  the  city  is  therefore  bound  up  with  the  question 
of  how  the  Arno  came  to  be  thus  diverted  from 
what  must  have  been  its  original  course.  For  the 
Florentine  Val  d'Arno  is  clearly  but  a  substitute 
that  acts  now  in  place  of  the  Val  di  Chiana,  by 
which  our  river  must  once  have  found  its  way  to 
the  Tiber  and  the  southern  sea. 

h'ire  as  well  as  water  has  played  no  small  part 
in  fashioning  the  earth  as  we  find  it,  and  the  geology 
of  Tuscany  acquaints  us  with  a  volcanic  eruption 
which  took  place  after   the   lines   of  the    Apennine 


The  Val  d'Arno  5 

had  been  laid  down  ;  interfering  with  some  of  these, 
and  widely  changing  the  levels  of  the  inner  land 
they  enclose.  The  focus  of  this  explosion  would 
seem  to  have  lain  south  of  Siena,  and  we  may  take 
the  Monte  Amiata,  with  its  volcanic  rocks,  as  fixing 
the  site  of  one  of  the  principal  craters.  This,  then, 
was  the  upheaval  which  lifted  the  whole  inner 
hill-country  of  Tuscany  to  its  present  level,  and 
created  the  new  drainage  lines  we  now  observe.  It 
broke  the  valleys  across  their  backs  on  a  line  of 
depression  now  marked  by  the  course  of  the  middle 
and  lower  Arno  from  Pontassieve  to  the  sea,  and 
on  the  other  hand  lifted  a  new  watershed  near 
Arezzo,  barring  the  ancient  southern  escape,  divid- 
ing the  Chiane,  and  turning  the  Arno  northward 
down  the  new  slope  till  the  river  found  the  great 
line  of  depression  in  which  it  still  flows  westward 
under  the  walls  of  Florence.  So,  too,  it  may  be 
observed,  the  Serchio  turns  westward  above  Lucca, 
and,  in  a  lesser  degree,  the  Magra  from  Aulla  ;  for 
these  effects,  in  their  relative  positions  and  decreas- 
ing series,  show  plainly  whence  proceeded  the  force 
that  caused  them.  Thus  Magra,  Serchio,  and  Arno 
point  in  a  new  evidence  to  the  country  south  of 
Siena  as  the  focus  of  this  wide  tectonic  movement 
of  the  Tuscan  land. 

Here  it  is  necessary  to  notice  more  closely  the 
effects  of  the  great  change  on  the  Val  d'Arno  itself 
If  the  present  westward   line  of  the  river  represent 


6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

what  may  be  called  the  hinge  of  the  movement — 
the  line  along  which  the  original  north-west  by 
south-east  valleys  were  broken  when  the  lower 
southern  end  of  each  was  lifted  to  a  new  watershed 
in  the  present  hills  of  the  Chianti  and  Volterra — 
then  it  is  plain  that  these  valleys,  no  longer  able  to 
drain  to  the  south-east,  must  have  become  lakes  ; 
the  new  reservoirs  of  waters  that  rose  in  each  till 
they  found  the  lowest  points  of  escape.  As  such 
outlets  lay,  of  course,  along  the  line  of  depression 
where  the  ridges  had  been  broken  across,  and  as 
this  line  was  itself  inclined,  falling  from  ridge  to 
lower  ridge  till  it  lay  on  the  plain  and  touched  the 
sea  of  Pisa,  we  are  to  think  of  a  series  of  parallel 
lakes,  each  higher  than  the  last,  if  it  lie  more  east- 
ward, joined  to  each  other  by  as  many  short,  steep 
rivers,  rapids,  and  falls.  These  already  begin  to 
trace  in  broken  fashion  the  western  course  of  the 
Arno  as  we  know  it  to-day. 

So  when  the  Arno  turned  at  Arezzo  it  fell  at  once 
into  a  lake  fed  from  the  Sieve,  and  which  its  stream 
helped  to  fill  at  the  Imbuto.  At  Pontassieve  lay 
the  point  of  escape,  whence  the  stream  began  to  run 
down  to  the  Girone.  Merc  it  met  another  lake, 
much  wider  and  larger,  that  must  have  covered  the 
site  of  Florence  and  reached  as  far  as  Pistoia  and 
Signa.  The  line  of  depression  passed  the  latter 
place,  and  here,  then,  the  water  again  found  its 
escape  by  the  strait  of  the  Golfolina  to  Montelupo 


The  Val  d'Arno  7 

and  the  sea,  or  salt  lagoon,  which  must  then  have 
covered  so  much  of  the  Pisan  plain.  One  begins  to 
see   it  all :  the  short,   rapid   reaches   that   ran    from 


ROCK    AND    KI\ER    AT    THE    GOEFUI.INA 

lake  to  lake,  as   it   were  from  lock  to  lock,  and  the 
descending  valley  staircase  on   the  steps  of  which 
these  waters  lay,  or  plunged   from   level  to  level  by 
their  western  line  of  descent  to  find  at  last  the  sea. 
Now  this  was  a  state  of  things  which  could  not 


TYRRHENIAN 

SEA  ti 


.IW.Hrown  ,lol. 


] 


I 

THE  VAL  D'ARNO 
as  it  once  was 


^ 


S  e 


ESS  ION 


V 


O  K 


UPHEAVAL 


A  mo 


Emery  Walker  sc. 


lo  Florence  Past  and  Present 

last,  for  a  certain  change  was  bound  up  in  its  very 
being.  Born  of  eruption,  it  brought  erosion  ;  a 
necessary  consequence  as  the  waters  moved  in 
volume  and  force  on  their  new  line.  The  rock  of 
the  Golfolina  lies  high  on  the  hill  to-day,  yet  who 
can  doubt,  seeing  it  so  plainly  waterworn,  that  the 
river  was  once  at  work  in  this  place  and  at  this 
level.  If  it  flows  lower  now,  that  can  only  be 
because  it  has  cut  the  gorge  in  which  its  waters  still 
move.  And  the  work  done  below  Signa  is  only  a 
sample  of  what  the  new  Arno  was  busy  about  as 
soon  as  it  found  by  force  this  line  of  fall  from  lake 
to  lake  ;  between  Pontassieve  and  the  Girone,  there- 
fore, not  less  than  from  Signa  to  Montelupo. 

The  result  of  such  river  action  can  only  have  been 
the  disappearance  of  the  lakes  through  which  the 
Arno  once  found  its  way  to  the  sea.  There  was  a 
double  reason  for  this  change.  On  the  one  hand,  as 
the  depth  of  the  lakes  was  from  the  first  determined 
by  the  height  of  their  lowest  points  of  escape,  so  of 
necessity,  as  the  gorges  between  them  were  cut  down 
and  ever  deeper  by  the  moving,  falling  waters,  the 
lakes  tended  to  drain  away  with  the  stream,  and 
became  shallower  and  ever  more  shallow,  losing  in 
extent  too  as  they  lost  in  depth.  Ikit  the  cutting 
of  the  gorges  implies  the  transport  downstream  of 
the  material — the  rocks,  stones,  and  sand — that  once 
filled  them.  These  will  settle  where  the  river  loses 
speed    in   the  lake,   and   thus  the  lakes  will  tend  to 


The  Val  d'Arno  1 1 

shallow  and  disappear  under  a  double  action,  since, 
as  their  waters  drain  away,  a  rising  alluvial  plain  is 
ever  lifting  the  lake  bed  and  making  the  escape 
easier  and  more  complete.  Thus  at  last  the  river 
emerges  as  a  line  of  water  movement  united  through- 
out its  whole  extent,  for,  while  it  now  runs  steadier 
in  the  gorges  it  has  deepened,  these  are  no  longer 
its  only  reaches.  The  lakes  have  disappeared ; 
only  swamps  remain  in  the  deeper  depressions  of 
their  former  beds  ;  and  through  alluvial  plains,  now 
comparatively  dry,  the  Arno  finds  a  wayward  and 
changeful  course  from  gorge  to  gorge,  its  shallows, 
its  digressions,  and  its  returns  occupying  the  ground 
where  each  lake  once  lay.  This  new  feature  is 
particularly  noticeable  at  and  below  the  site  of 
Florence,  for,  with  the  disappearance  of  the  lake  into 
which  the  Arno  once  fell  at  the  Girone,  dry  ground 
at  last  emerged  here,  and  the  city  stands  to-day  on 
gravel  and  sand  that  the  falling,  flowing  waters  have 
brought  and  left  to  be  its  site.  This,  in  its  briefest 
terms,  is  the  first  contribution  of  geology  and  physics 
to  the  long  history  of  the  place. 

The  artificial,  as  distinguished  from  the  natural, 
appears  always  and  everywhere  with  the  advent  of 
man,  nor  can  the  Val  d'Arno  offer  any  exception  to 
the  rule.  Yet  at  first  man  is  passive  rather  than 
active,  acted  on  rather  than  acting,  and  here  then 
our  first  concern  will  be  to  see  what  effect  this  land 
must  have   had   on    the   men   who   first   reached    it 


1 2  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Whence  they  came  is,  as  yet,  of  no  importance,  and 
the  changes  they  ultimately  wrought  here  may  be 
left  for  after  consideration  ;  it  is  the  action  of  the 
land  on  its  first  colonists  that  must  now  be  deter- 


IN   THE   TUSCAN   WOODLAND 


mined  ;    the   rest    will    follow    as    a    natural    conse- 
quence. 

The  middle  Val  d'Arno,  when  man  first  saw  it, 
must  have  been  nearly,  if  not  quite,  what  it  is  now, 
with  this  considerable  difference,  however,  that  then 
it  was  all  wood  and  water.  The  oak  and  stone 
pine,  the  chestnut  and  cypress,  with  all  the  lesser 
trees,  covered  every  yard  of  dry  ground  in  the  close 


The  Val  d'Arno  13 

ranks  that  nature  had  set,  and  climbed  the  hills  to 
flourish  on  their  crests.  Below,  wherever  it  could 
lie  or  move  in  valley  or  plain,  lay  water,  spreading 
in  swamps  among  tufts  of  coarse  marsh  grasses  or 
tall  reeds,  finding  its  way  across  these  wet  levels  in 
a  hundred  shallow  and  changeful  channels  to  pour 
presently  in  volume  and  speed  down  the  falling 
passage  that  the  gorge  opened  to  it.  And  all  this 
life,  of  moving  water  and  of  growing,  waving  wood, 
was  fulfilled  by  the  other  higher  life  it  came  to 
contain  in  abundance  :  the  fish  that  moved  quicker 
than  the  stream,  the  birds  and  beasts  that  made 
the  woods  their  home.  When  man  at  last  appeared 
in  the  Val  d'Arno  it  was  not  a  land  either  naked 
or  dead  to  which  he  came,  but  one  quick  and 
clothed  upon  with  life,  and  able  therefore  to  in- 
fluence profoundly  its  latest  living  guest. 

In  general,  it  may  be  said  that  a  country  acts  on 
its  inhabitants  by  sifting  them  out.  This  it  does  by 
the  conditions  of  life  it  offers,  which  its  inhabitants 
must  needs  accept  if  they  are  to  live  there  at  all. 
Now  in  the  Val  d'Arno  these  primitive  conditions 
are  plain,  and  the  action  of  the  place  upon  its 
first  human  inhabitants  obvious.  The  land  is  all 
wood  and  water,  therefore  the  hunter  and  the  fisher 
are  the  only  men  it  can  maintain.  Farmers  may 
live  and  thrive  in  the  valley  of  the  Po  with  its  great 
alluvial  plains ;  here  such  fields  still  lie  sodden  in 
marsh   water,  or   lost    under  the  salt    of  the  dying 


14  Florence  Past  and  Present 

lagoon.  Shepherds  may  feed  their  flocks  in  the 
Campagna  by  the  Tiber,  for  the  grasslands  of 
Latium  are  wide  and  ready  for  such  life.  But  here, 
by  the  Arno,  only  the  hunter  and  fisher  can  as  yet 
live ;  others,  if  they  come,  must  pass  on  or  die, 
acted  on  or  driven  by  the  local  conditions.  Every 
land  deals  thus  with  its  immigrants,  and  the  result 
of  such  natural  selection  in  the  valley  we  are  study- 
ing is  too  plain  to  need  further  proof.  The  first 
men  here  will  be  hunters  and  fishers. 

This  fact  assured,  it  is  easy  to  find  in  it  a  fresh 
point  of  departure  ;  so  obvious  are  the  consequences 
it  involves.  Unlike  the  shepherd  or  farmer,  the 
hunter  and  fisher  marry  early,  under  a  natural 
human  impulse  which  in  their  case  is  not  checked 
by  artificial  obstacles.  The  farmer  must  have  land 
and  house,  or  at  least  his  plough  and  yoke  of  oxen, 
before  he  can  take  a  wife  ;  and  the  shepherd  must 
wait,  like  Jacob,  till  he  has  gathered  a  flock;  but 
the  skill  of  the  hunter  and  fisher  is  born  with  them, 
and  sufficiently  developed  in  boyhood,  and  the  bow 
and  arrow,  the  snare  and  net,  even  the  dugout 
canoe,  are  theirs  at  the  price  of  a  few  days',  perhaps 
of  a  few  hours',  work  only  ;  with  this  consequence, 
that  they  marry  as  soon  as  their  wishes  meet  a 
suitable  occasion  and  response.  Now,  large  families 
are  the  consequence-of  early  marriages,  and  when 
one  remembers  that  much  more  land  is  needed  to 
support   the   hunter    than   suffices   for  the  shepherd 


The  Val  d'Arno  15 

or  farmer,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  this  form  of  human 
life  spreads  quicker  than  the  others,  covers  all  the 
ground  available  to  it,  and  soon  reaches  the  limits 
set  by  nature  to  its  further  progress  on  these 
lines.  In  the  case  of  Tuscany  such  limits  will  lie 
at  the  Lombard  plain  on  the  north,  and,  on  the 
south,  at  the  first  levels  of  the  Roman  Campagna. 
The  hunters  and  fishers  we  have  found  by  the 
Arno  will  spread,  and  spread  quickly,  as  far  as 
there  are  woods  to  beat  or  waters  to  drag.  They 
will  climb  the  Apennine,  and  reach  the  last  trees 
on  the  farther  slope.  They  will  press  south  through 
the  great  Ciminian  forest,  till  the  heights  that 
harbour  it  drop  to  the  valley  of  the  Tiber.  In  a 
word,  they  will  not  pause  till  stopped  on  the  edge 
of  lands  occupied  by  men  of  another  way  of  life, 
and  offering  little  or  nothing  of  that  which  they 
seek. 

Thus  lands  of  wood  and  water  only,  sift  their 
inhabitants,  but  scatter  them  too  ;  and  this  not  only 
as  we  have  seen — separating  the  one  from  the  other 
by  spaces  of  woodland,  and  river  reaches  that  are 
necessarily  long  and  wide — but  sending  them  far 
afield  in  their  chase,  and  encouraging  them  to 
follow  the  game  in  its  migrations,  or  the  movement 
of  the  fish  up  or  down  stream.  This  then  is  not 
the  place,  nor  are  these  the  people,  for  close  famih- 
life  on  the  pattern  of  the  patriarchal  household. 
Such  nearer  society  the  hunter  and  fisher  leave  to 


1 6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

the  shepherd  and  farmer,  and  instead  they  multiply 
in  these  wilds  and  subdue  them  in  a  succession  of 
scattered  families,  that  ever  part  and  move  on  till 
the  limits  of  their  common  possession  in  wood  and 
stream  are  reached,  and  further  progress  on  these 
lines  becomes  impossible.  As  multiplication,  how- 
ever, still  goes  on  without  corresponding  increase 
in  the  means  of  subsistence,  some  change  is  clearly 
imminent.  The  hunter  and  fisher  are  now  at  the 
point  when,  under  the  pressure  of  stern  necessity, 
they  must  become  other  than  they  have  been.  Let 
us  try  to  see  in  what  direction  this  inevitable  change 
is  likely  to  carry  them. 

When  they  have  gone  as  far  as  they  can  across 
country,  these  men  are  in  contact  at  last  with  others 
of  a  different  way  of  life,  with  the  farmers  of 
Lombardy  on  the  north,  and  the  shepherds  of 
Latium  on  the  south  ;  for  not  the  woodland  and 
stream  alone,  but  the  alluvial  plain  and  the  grass- 
lands too,  have  power  to  shape  by  their  own  nature 
the  lives  of  their  inhabitants.  Will,  then,  the  woods 
and  the  streams  of  Tuscany  that  lie  between  yield 
their  surplus  population  to  the  farms  of  the  north 
or  the  pastures  of  the  south  ?  Will  the  hunter  and  the 
fisher  find  new  worlds  to  conquer  by  simply  imitat- 
ing the  men  who  live  just  beyond  their  borders? 
Not  so,  for  all  experience  teaches  us  that  such  a 
change,  on  any  large  scale,  is  unnatural.  The 
difference  between  these  ways  of  life  is  too  great  to 


The  Val  d'Arno  17 

be  easily  overcome.  The  hunter  and  fisher  must 
and  will  develop,  but  their  progress  will  move  along 
lines  of  its  own.  They  will  find  some  outlet,  some 
new  occupation,  but  it  will  be  one  for  which  their 
situation,  their  trained  faculties,  and  acquired  experi- 
ence, alike  fit  them  ;  not  theirs  then  the  labour  of 
the  plough  or  the  care  of  the  flock,  where  they  have 
everything  to  learn  and  everything  to  forget. 

The  new  way  that  opens  before  them  is  that  of 
trade,  but  before  we  follow  them  in  it  let  us  pause 
to  see  what  we  have  gained.  The  hunter  and  fisher, 
in  adopting  a  life  of  commerce,  are  not  going  to 
leave  their  past  behind  ;  they  will  carry  it  along 
with  them.  The  story  of  Florence  acquaints  us 
with  a  city  founded  on  trade  and  growing  in  its 
expansion.  But,  if  we  are  right,  these  traders  set 
by  the  Arno  were  hunters  and  fishers  first  of  all. 
Hence  a  new  reason  why  we  should  break  off"  here 
to  study  afresh  this  primitive  life  of  the  woodland 
and  the  stream.  For  if  it  have  left  traces  of  itself 
in  the  life  of  to-day  as  we  find  it  in  the  Tuscan 
capital,  all  the  more  reason  will  there  be  to  conclude 
that  the  hunter  and  the  fisher  were  indeed  the  first 
ancestors  of  the  modern  Florentine. 


CHAPTER  II 

FOOD   AND    MAGIC 

The  prime  necessity  of  the  hunter  and  fisher,  as  of  all 
men  in  all  circumstances,  is  food  ;  but  what  distin- 
guishes him  from  others  is  the  kind  of  food  on  which 
he  lives,  and  the  way  he  procures  it.  Be  sure  that 
this  manner  of  life,  like  every  other,  has  its  own 
conditions  which,  perforce  and  constantly  obeyed, 
end  by  leaving  a  deep  impression  on  the  race.  Now 
among  these  the  first  to  be  noticed  is  that  of  the 
enforced  fast,  with  its  consequence  in  the  acquisition 
of  an  extraordinary  power  of  voluntary  abstinence. 
The  descendants  of  the  hunter  and  the  fisher  are 
likely  to  show  a  marked  self-restraint  in  these 
matters,  and,  while  ready  to  feast  on  occasion,  will 
practise  economy  as  the  general  rule  of  their  eating 
and  drinking. 

In  the  Tuscany  we  think  of,  a  game  preserve  was 
unknown,  and  the  breeding  of  fish  unheard  of;  and 
men  followed  the  chase  under  absolutely  natural 
conditions.  When  the  fish  moved  upstream,  or  the 
quails  came  over  from  Africa,  there  would  be  plenty; 


Food  and  Magic  19 

but  when  the  hunter  missed  the  trail,  or  the  fisher 
threw  his  net  in  vain,  when  the  boar  hid  himself 
from  the  heat  in  inaccessible  swamps,  or  the  birds 
and  deer  migrated,  those  that  depended  on  them 
must  go  without  such  provend,  and  stay  their  hunger 
as  best  they  could  ;  happy  if  wild  fruit  were  still  on 
the  trees,  or  earth  nuts  to  be  had  for  the  digging. 
More  and  more  must  the  uncertainty  of  their  sub- 
sistence have  pressed  on  these  men  as  their  numbers 
grew,  and  they  filled  the  land.  It  was  a  stern 
discipline,  then,  under  which  they  lived,  and  one 
which  fitted  them  to  bear  extreme  changes,  from 
want  to  sudden  plenty  and  then  again  to  want, 
without  flinching.  But  ever,  as  time  went  on  and 
the  tribes  multiplied,  it  was  hunger  rather  than 
excess  that  formed  the  rule,  and  moulded  the  temper 
of  the  race  to  self-restraint:  a  quality  fit  to  pass  by 
inheritance,  and  to  appear  as  the  ruling  character  of 
distant  generations.  The  flint  arrow-heads  used  by 
these  people  in  the  chase  are  still  turned  up  here 
and  there  where  the  Tuscan  earth  is  moved,  but 
these,  after  all,  might  be  held  as  onl}-  the  relics  of 
a  race  that  had  passed  on.  An  acquired  racial 
characteristic,  on  the  other  hand,  is  the  fruit  of  ages 
spent  in  one  way  of  life  under  certain  conditions. 
If,  therefore,  the  restraint  natural  to  the  first 
dwellers  in  the  Arno  valley  be  found  to  distinguish 
their  successors  to-day,  this  suggests  that  they 
are  not  only  successors  but  descendants  ;   that  the 


20  Florence  Past  and  Present 

race  is  one,  and  has  kept  and  carried  its  primitive 
stamp  past  all  the  changes  that  have  happened 
since. 

Now,  in  a  hundred  signs,  this  temperance  in  food 
and  drink  may  be  seen  to-day  at  Florence.  The 
market  and  its  habits  surprise  the  stranger,  and  if 
he  analyse  the  matter  he  will  find  that  a  wise  and 
convenient  economy  is  the  principle  that  accounts 
for  what  he  wonders  at.  One  example  of  this, 
trivial  though  it  be,  may  suffice  to  prove  the  case. 
The  Florentine  chicken,  having  regard  to  its  size, 
is  now  probably  no  cheaper  than  such  a  fowl  would 
be  anywhere  else.  But  small  as  it  is,  the  bird  is 
dealt  with  as  if  it  were  a  sheep  :  cut  up,  joint  by 
joint ;  decomposed  into  the  elements  of  wings  and 
legs  and  breast  and  body,  which  are  each  sold 
separately.  Even  the  combs  of  the  cocks  are  clipped 
off,  and  the  gizzards  and  livers  laid  apart ;  with  the 
result  that  the  buyer  can  consult  his  taste,  and  com- 
pose dishes  that,  if  not  substantial,  are  at  least 
dainty  in  their  nice  economy.  So  far  is  the  matter 
pushed,  that  I  have  heard  of  a  stranger  to  Tuscan 
ways  whose  ignorance  of  market  usage  led  to  his 
disappointment  at  dinner-time.  He  had  told  his 
servant  to  buy  and  prepare  him  a  dish  of  fowls'  legs, 
and  found,  when  it  came  to  table,  that  these  'legs' 
were  only  drumsticks.  On  complaint,  he  was  told 
the  mistake  had  been  his  own,  as,  if  he  wished  the 
thighs   as  well,  he  should   have  said   so !     To  such 


Food  and  Magic  21 

lengths  does  the  Florentine  still  go  in  the  careful 
economy  of  the  table. 

It  might  be  thought,  indeed,  that  these  habits  were 
comparatively  modern,  and  rather  the  result  of 
decaying  trade  here  than  survivals  from  any  more 
remote  past.  But  that  this  is  not  so  appears  from 
the  fact  that  even  in  her  greatest  days,  when 
Florence  sat  queen  and  wanted  for  nothing,  she 
followed  the  same  rule  of  self-restraint  and  wise 
parsimony.  A  Bull  of  Eugenius  IV.  (1431-39)  speaks 
of  the  'frugalitas  Florentina,'  which  indeed  was  and 
is  proverbial  : — 

'  II  Fiorentino  mangia  si  poco,  e  si  pulito, 
Che  sempre  si  conserva  Tappetito.' 

Doni,  who  lived  and  wrote  a  century  later,  tells  the 
same  story.  In  his  Zucca  (Ramo,  ch.  v.)  he  de- 
scribes a  banquet  given  at  Venice  by  a  rich 
Lombard  :  how  the  talk  at  table  fell  on  Florence, 
and  how  the  company,  full-fed,  mocked  at  the 
'  onciate  di  carne  che  gl'usano  di  comprare  (cosa 
favolosa  da  plebei  a  dirla)  per  il  viver  della  famiglia 
di  casa.'  He  was  himself  present,  and,  being  a 
Florentine,  found  the  situation  awkward.  If  the 
charge  had  been  false,  be  sure  he  would  have  said 
so,  yet,  when  he  spoke,  it  was  but  to  declare  with 
national  pride :  '  I  Fiorentini  insegnano  la  tem- 
peranza  nel  vivere.'  Florence,  too,  could  feast,  as 
she  still  does  on  occasion,  but  her  rule  has  always 


2  2  Florence  Past  and  Present 

been  that  of  temperance ;  born,  we  may  be  sure,  in 
the  earliest  days  of  all,  when  the  long  hunter's  fast 
divided  his  brief  and  occasional  days  of  plenty,  and 
formed  a  lasting  habit  of  self-restraint  that  persists 
even  under  the  changed  conditions  of  later  and 
modern  life. 

In  the  absence  of  game  or  fish  the  first  Tuscans 
must  have  fallen  back  on  the  fruits  of  the  earth  for 
a  scanty  subsistence  :  nor  only  then,  for  at  all  times 
the  natural  harvest  of  the  wood  must  have  given 
them  what  man  needs,  the  mixed  diet,  not  wholly 
animal  but  vegetable  as  well.  Be  sure  they  gathered 
acorns,  and  chestnuts  too,  in  autumn,  and  found  this 
advantage  in  the  harvest,  that  such  provision,  unlike 
that  of  fish  or  game,  could  be  kept  for  months  and 
consumed  carefully  as  required.  If  the  uncertainty 
of  the  chase  taught  the  hunter  self-restraint  in  the 
use  of  food,  it  was  in  great  measure  here  that  he 
could,  and  did,  practise  parsimony  ;  living  on  rations 
of  nut  meal  till  fortune  met  him  again  in  the  wood 
or  on  the  river. 

Here,  too,  there  is  distinct  survival  of  early  habits. 
It  is  hardly  necessary  to  quote  Pliny  for  the  primitive 
use  of  the  acorn  ;  ^  Procopius,  however,  is  more  to 
our  purpose,  telling  of  what  happened  in  539  A.D., 
when  the  Goths  were  in  the  Val  d'Arno  :  how  the 
wretched  people  were  reduced  to  eat  bread  made  of 
acorns,  for  thus,  under  stress  of  circumstances,  men 

'  See,  however,  N.H.,  vii.  56  and  xvi.  proctm. 


Food  and  Magic  23 

are  seen  returning  to  their  first  habits  of  life.^  Nay, 
if  we  pass  from  the  oak  to  the  chestnut,  the  matter 
is  surer  still,  and  may  safely  and  evidently  be 
connected  with  what  Florence  and  its  neighbour- 
hood can  still  show. 

The  taste  for  chestnuts  here  is  very  strong,  and 
these,  prepared  in  many  different  ways,  form  to-day 
no  small  part  of  the  sustenance  of  the  people.  At 
the  street  corners  in  winter  the  chestnut  stalls  spread 
the  ruddy  glow  of  their  fires,  and  the  tempting 
odour  of  their  hot  ware  :  the  arrostitc  that  perfume 
the  air  around.  Often  you  will  see  the  passer-by 
become  the  purchaser  ;  the  quilted  cover  is  lifted,  the 
handful  of  hot  chestnuts  measured,  and  the  buyer 
moves  on,  munching  cheerfully  what  has  already 
served  to  warm  his  frost-bitten  hands.  These  stalls 
are  picturesque  but  peripatetic  ;  they  lead  up  to  the 
regular  shop  in  this  kind,  which  stands  open  in  the 
poorer  streets,  and  caters  for  their  inhabitants  on  a 
larger  scale  and  with  more  variety.  Here  are  not 
only  roast  chestnuts,  but  chestnuts  boiled,  with  just 
that  spice  of  fennel  in  the  water  which  meets  the 
Florentine  taste,  and  tempers  the  natural  quality  of 
this  somewhat  heavy  food.  The  bollitc  lie  here  in 
the  huge  coppers  that  have  served  to  cook  them, 
and   on   a    wooden    board   stands    the    ereat    round 


^  Procopius,  De  Bella  Gothico,  ii.  20.  See,  however,  Cini, 
Monlagiia  Pistoiese  (Firenze,  1737),  p.  16,  who  points  out  ih.it  the 
'  glans  '  of  the  ancients  as  often  meant  a  chestnut  as  an  acorn. 


24  Florence  Past  and  Present 

polcnda,  smoking  hot.  This,  too,  is  made  of  chestnut 
flour,  and  must  be  very  popular,  to  judge  by  the  rate 
at  which  it  disappears  as  the  string  cuts  into  its 
chocolate-coloured  mass,  and  it  goes  off  slice  by 
slice  :  a  cheap  and  comforting  morsel  in  cold  days. 
There  is  the  castagnaccio ,  too,  also  made  of  chestnut 
flour,  but  prepared  differently,  and  in  its  way  a 
triumph  of  the  art.  For  it  a  large  round  copper 
tray  with  a  shallow  border  is  used.  This  is  oiled, 
filled  with  a  wide  thin  cake  of  dough  sprinkled  with 
pine  nuts,  and  set  to  cook  over  the  fire.  The  copper 
retains  the  heat  well,  and  when  the  cooking  is  done 
many  a  cake  of  castagnaccio  is  sent  in  its  tray  to  the 
bridges,  where,  as  you  cross  the  Arno,  you  may  see 
it  sold  at  a  half-penny  a  slice.  There  was — is  still 
— a  dark  shop  under  the  arch  of  San  Piero,  as  you 
come  into  the  market  from  the  Via  dell'  Orivolo, 
which  had  a  great  reputation  for  this  dainty,  nor  is 
it  so  long  since  an  authentic  count  and  countess 
might  be  seen  eating  castagnaccio  in  the  streets  as 
they  walked  ;  people  of  such  ancient  descent  and 
acknowledged  position  that  they  could  laugh  at  the 
prejudices  of  their  class  as  they  followed  the  old 
Florentine  habit.  It  may  be  added  that  most  of 
the  btirjrjurri,  as  the  chestnut  sellers  are  called  here, 
come  from  the  Italian  foothills  of  the  Alps:  a  sign 
of  the  strong  demand  at  Florence  for  their  art  and 
wares. 

Not,  observe,  that  the  Val  d'Arno  does  not  grow 


Food  and  Magic  25 

chestnuts  of  its  own.  These  fine  trees  are  common 
in  the  hills  above  Pistoia,  where  their  fruit  is 
anxiously  expected  and  gathered  as  the  principal 
harvest  of  the  year,  and  where  the  hill  people 
depend  chiefly  on  chestnuts  still  as  their  main 
sustenance.  The  form  this  food  takes  with  them 
is,  in  the  main,  the  same  polcuda  dolcc  we  have 
already  met  at  Florence,  but  instead  of  the 
broad,  rich  Florentine  castagnaccio  they  have  the 
necci,  smaller  cakes  of  the  same  kind.  Here,  in 
the  cooking  of  the  nccci,  a  further  survival  may  be 
seen,  and  one  that  seems  to  make  our  whole  con- 
tention plain.  Each  kitchen  in  the  hills  has  by  the 
jamb  of  its  great  fireplace  a  pile  of  flat  round  stones 
laid  one  on  top  of  the  other.  These  are  heated 
betimes  in  the  fire,  and  then,  when  the  chestnut 
dough  has  been  mixed,  and  the  pine  nuts  added,  and 
the  whole  formed  into  thin  round  cakes,  a  hot  stone 
by  the  fire  forms  the  foundation  on  which  a  cake, 
wrapped  in  chestnut  leaves,  is  laid.  This  is  covered 
by  another  hot  stone,  and  so  on  till  the  pile  is  built 
complete,  of  cakes  and  stones  alternately.  Thus,  as 
will  be  seen,  the  chestnut  and  the  pine  furnish  the 
whole  material  of  this  food,  and  the  cooking,  being 
done  by  hot  stones  applied  to  the  cakes  in  this 
ingenious  way,  is  primitive  too  ;  only  to  be  paralleled 
by  savage  ways  of  baking  and  boiling,  which,  if  used 
to-day,  are  yet  known  as  a  direct  inheritance  from 
the  earliest  times.      Not  only  the  continued  use  of 


26  Florence  Past  and  Present 

the  chestnut  then,  but  the  manner  of  its  preparation 
as  food  in  the  wilder  hills,  suggest  strongly  that  the 
present  inhabitants  of  the  Val  d'Arno  are  the  direct 
descendants  of  the  first  woodmen  in  this  valley. 

Such  trivial  details,  though  important  in  the  con- 
clusions to  which  they  lead,  are  in  themselves  of 
little  consequence.  Not  so,  however,  the  greater 
subject  of  Florentine  superstition  and  magic  in  all 
its  forms.  Superstition,  as  its  very  name  indicates, 
is  what  has  survived  of  ancient  thought  and  practice. 
In  Italy  it  means  the  persistence  of  early  beliefs  and 
rites,  even  after  the  coming  of  Christianity.  And 
magic  is  a  name  to  conjure  with  still.  It  will  not 
indeed  be  possible  to  do  more  here  than  touch  so 
wide  a  subject;  enough  if  we  can  see  that,  most 
remotely  and  essentially,  superstition  and  magic  are 
the  heritage  left  by  the  woodmen  to  their  successors 
in  the  Val  d'Arno  ;  this  done,  such  things  m.ay  be 
trusted  of  themselves  to  declare  their  own  importance, 
if  not  the  value  of  the  legacy. 

If  one  were  asked  to  find  a  point  of  direct  con- 
nection between  superstition  and  the  woodland 
habits  just  discussed,  it  would  perhaps  be  enough  to 
recall  our  point  of  departure  in  the  enforced  fasts  of 
the  hunter.  Fasting  has  always  played  a  great 
part,  for  good  or  evil,  in  all  religious  systems,  and 
its  physical  and  mental  effects  are  so  well  known 
that  there  is  no  need  to  insist  on  them.  In  certain 
savage  tribes  boys  are  made  to  fast  at  their  entry  on 


Food  and  Magic  27 

manhood^  with  a  very  practical  purpose.  In  this 
state  it  is  found  they  readily  see  visions,  and  the 
first  animal  they  thus  visualise  becomes  their 
personal  totem  for  life  ;  a  thing  to  be  regarded  with 
superstitious  reverence.  Now  whether  or  not  there 
was  ever  totemism  in  the  Arno  valley,  it  is  quite 
certain  that  the  first  inhabitants  here  followed  a  life 
not  unlike  that  of  those  savages  who  still  practise 
this  peculiar  custom.  And  here  loo  there  must  then 
have  been  dreaming  of  strange  da}'-dreams,  for  the 
power  of  fasting  to  produce  these  does  not  in  the 
least  degree  depend  upon  will  or  design. 

The  background  of  this  phantasmagoria  was,  of 
course,  nature  itself:  the  woods  and  waters  of  the 
Val  d'Arno  seen  under  the  veil  of  night,  when  the 
hunter  is  on  foot  after  his  quarry  hoping  to  surprise 
it  at  rest,  and  when  torches  are  lit  on  the  river  to 
attract  the  fish.  If  you  have  ever  walked  late  in 
this  country  during  early  summer  when  the  fire- 
flies are  out,  you  do  not  need  to  be  told  how  it  still 
lends  itself  to  illusion  ;  how,  between  the  fixed  lights 
above  and  those  that  move  below,  the  heavens  seem 
doubled  ;  how  this  spangled  orb  above  and  beneath 
seems  to  make  the  earth  with  its  solidity  sink  away, 
till  only  the  dark  woods  of  the  horizon,  dividing  the 
upper  from  the  under  world,  remain  as  a  refuge  for 
retreating  reality  :  themselves  but  the  shadow  of  a 

^  See  Frazer,  Totnuiiiit  (1887),  p.  53  ct  seq.  ;  also  Golden 
Bougli  (1900),  iii.  p.  430. 


28  Florence  Past  and  Present 

shade.  i\t  such  moments  a  man  clings  to  his  self- 
consciousness  as  his  surest  hold  on  the  everyday 
world,  and  what  then  if  fasting  have  weakened  him 
in  his  own  being?  Anything  will  then  be  possible 
in  the  way  of  illusion  and  of  vision. 

Thus  the  woods  and  the  waters  became  peopled 
with  wood  and  with  water  spirits,  always  present 
and  sometimes  visible,  especially  at  night.  It  was, 
as  it  were,  a  transference  that  took  place,  wherein 
man,  his  vitality  enfeebled  by  fasting,  recognised 
what  he  had  lost  in  whatever  met  his  eye  at 
moments  like  these,  and  gave  the  tree  and  the 
stream  a  soul  and  spirit  of  their  own.  Yet,  in 
reality,  these  were  not  theirs  but  his  ;  a  projection 
of  himself  upon  nature.  The  miracle  lay  in 
humanity,  with  fasting  as  the  means  to  it,  and  some 
lingering  sense  of  this  fact  is  perhaps  the  true 
explanation  of  totemism.  For  the  doctrine  of  the 
totem  proclaims  that  in  it  man  has  found  a  spirit 
of  kin  to  his  own,  or  has  even  learned  to  transfer 
his  soul  elsewhere. 

There  will  yet  be  time  and  opportunity  to  enlarge 
on  this  matter,  and  to  point  out  the  various  forms 
and  actual  instances  in  which  the  dreams  of  early 
time  have  survived  to  our  own.  For  the  moment  it 
is  enough  to  say  that  the  belief  in  wood  and  water 
spirits  is  not  dead  to-day.  The  girls  of  the  Mugello 
are  still  careful  when  they  sit  down  with  their  backs 
to  a  tree,  lest  the  tree  spirit,  like  an  '  old  man  of  the 


Food  and  Magic  29 

sea,'  should  surprise  them.  The  spring  that  rises 
among  the  roots  of  an  ancient  ilex  near  Monte 
Murlo  is  still  visited  with  religious  reverence,  nor  is 
the  oak  of  Ginestra  forgotten  at  Signa.  An  un- 
published folk-tale,  collected  of  late  at  Florence,^ 
makes  a  tree  speak  when  the  woodman  cuts  it,  and 
in  the  Volterra  hills  I  found  'the  ladies  of  the 
laurel  '  very  present  to  popular  fancy  not  more  than 
two  years  ago.  These  are  all  clear  survivals  of  the 
time  when  Tuscany  was  covered  throughout  with 
natural  wood,  and  when  the  inhabitants  were 
hunters  and  fishers,  with  all  the  mental  habits  that 
such  a  life  implies. 

As  to  magic,  the  matter  is  not  less  plain,  if  a  little 
more  complicated.  There  are  two  theories,  on  one 
or  other  of  which  all  magic  is  built :  the  theory  of 
sympathy  and  that  of  i})iitation.  Under  the  first,  it 
is  supposed  that  when  a  connection  can  be  traced  or 
established  between  one  thing  and  another,  or  rather 
between  a  person  and  a  thing,  then  through  the  one 
it  is  possible  to  reach  and  affect  the  other.  Thus,  in 
magic  of  the  present  day,  nothing  is  commoner  than 
the  belief,  often  acted  on  still  at  Florence  and  in  its 
neighbourhood,  that  a  witch  may  be  put  in  pain,  and 
forced  to  declare  herself  for  further  punishment  till 
she  lift  the  spell,  simply  by  boiling  the  clothes  of 
the  person  bewitched.  She  feels  intolerable  heat, 
and  hastens  to  knock  at  the  door  of  the  house 
^  By  Mr.  C.  G.  Leland.     The  MS.  is  now  in  my  possession. 


30  Florence  Past  and  Present 

where  the  boiling  goes  on.  It  is  true  that  the  con- 
nection in  this  case  is  far  from  direct  or  immediate, 
for  the  clothes  so  treated  do  not  belong  to  the  witch 
herself.  But  it  is  no  less  plain  that  she  must  be 
thought  to  have  made  them  her  own  by  the  spell 
and  sickness  she  has  cast  on  the  wearer  in  a  kind  of 
jettatiira  :  a  self-projection  in  an  evil  sense.  Thus 
the  counter-spell  depends  for  its  supposed  efficacy 
on  the  theor}-  of  sympathy,  and  in  it  the  witch  is  as 
it  were  '  hoist  with  her  own  petard,'  for  by  her  witch- 
craft she  has  put  herself  in  some  degree  under  the 
power  of  those  she  has  injured.^ 

An  instance  of  magical  practice  at  once  clearer 
and  more  significant  will  be  found  in  \h^  pcdga  taja, 
the.  pi  an  til  tagliata,  or  cut  footstep,  of  the  Florentine 
Romagna  :  the  wild  hill-country  towards  Forli,  where 
life  is  still  primitive  and  much  superstition  lingers." 
This  magic  prescribes  the  cutting  of  earth  or  grass 
from  the  footprint  left  by  a  passer-by.  What  is 
cut  is  put  in  a  bag,  and  ma\'  then  be  used  to  cast  a 
spell  on  the  person  who  left  the  footprint.  It  v/ill  be 
seen  that  we  are  here  on  the  same  ground  of  sym- 
pathy, though  now  the  relation  between  the  person 
and  the  thing  is  more  direct.  Were  this  all,  however, 
the  instance  need  hardly  have  been  cited  ;  what 
makes  it  interesting  is  the  promise  it  holds  out  of 

^  For   English   instances,  see   (Jlanvill,   Sadd.    Triumph.,   4th   ed. 
pp.  327.  363- 

-  See  rilre,  Arch,  per  Trad.  Pop.,  vfil.  i.  p.  50. 


Food  and  Magic  31 

clearing  up  the  matter  so  as  to  make  plain  the  basis 
of  fact  on  which  this  part  of  the  magical  theory- 
rests  :  the  fundamental  truth  to  which  it  owes  its 
remarkable  persistence. 

What  one  wants  and  seeks  is  clearly  a  case  in 
which  connection,  more  or  less  close,  between  a 
person  and  a  thing  does  lead  to  distinct  and  import- 
ant results  ;  does  put  the  person  more  or  less  in  the 
power  of  any  one  who  can  gain  possession  of  the 
thing.  Now  the  value  of  the  pedga  taja  magic  lies 
here  that,  in  its  dependence  on  the  footstep,  it  sug- 
gests the  real  case  we  want.  If  the  foot  sink  deep 
enough,  it  leaves  a  trail  that  the  enemy  can  follow, 
with  certain  consequence  to  the  fugitive  when  the 
pursuer  gains  on  him.  Even  if  the  keenest  eye  can 
see  nothing  where  the  man  has  passed,  a  dog  will 
know,  and,  when  laid  on  the  trail,  will  lead  his  master 
to  the  same  great  moment  when  hatred  finds  its 
object  and  wreaks  its  will  as  far  as  strength  and 
weapons  will  serve.  Here  is  the  occasion  too  when 
the  least  belonging  of  a  man — any  trifle  he  has 
touched  or  worn — becomes  of  dread  importance, 
serving  to  complete  the  connection,  telling  the  hound 
what  he  has  to  do,  acting  as  a  conductor  towards  the 
final  discharge  in  which  human  passion  breaks  loose 
to  wound  and  to  kill. 

Can  it  be  doubtful  that  these  facts  are  the  founda- 
tion of  the  magic  which  depends  on  a  theory  of 
sympathy  between  persons  and  things.?     But  if  this 


J- 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


be  so,  then  one  sees  no  less  distinctly  the  kind  of  life 
in  which  such  magic  is  born.  Who  is  it  that  lives 
by  following  the  trail  ?  Who  gains  experience  by 
generations  of  hunger-sharpened  pursuit  of  game, 
till  his  insight  as  a  tracker  becomes  almost 
miraculous — at  least  magical — to  the  onlookers? 
Who  first  tames  and  trains  the  wild  dog  with  its 
faculties  ready  to  be  improved  beyond  those  of  man  ? 
There  can,  of  course,  be  only  one  answer;  it  is  the 
dweller  in  the  woods,  the  hunter,  whom  we  have 
thus  reached  again.  His  neighbours,  untrained  in 
his  school,  think  him  a  sorcerer  as  he  performs  these 
wonders.  He  begins  to  accept  the  suggestion,  and 
magic  is  born,  in  the  exaggeration  of  mere  fact  and 
truth.  But  from  the  first  this  magic  of  sympathy  is 
the  magic  of  the  woods. 

The  other  magical  theory  is  the  complement  of 
this.  It  gives  rise  to  what  has  been  called  honuvo- 
patJiic  magic  or,  more  simply,  the  magic  of  hnitation, 
practised  by  those  who  believe  that  to  imitate  any 
desired  effect  is  to  create  a  cause  quite  capable  of 
producing  it.  We  have  seen  this  at  work  already 
when  the  clothes  are  boiled  to  bring  the  witch  to 
justice  ;  the  boiling  of  the  clothes  is  supposed  to  be 
equivalent  to  the  boiling  of  the  woman  herself.  The 
fattura  della  morte,  or  death  spell,  is  but  another 
application  of  the  same  principle,  and  it  will  be  best 
understood  from  an  actual  case  which  happened  in 
Tuscany  a  few  years  ago.     Two  policemen  on  their 


Food  and  Magic  2>3 

nightly  beat  passed  the  gate  of  a  cemetery  and 
heard  suspicious  sounds.  Entering,  they  found  a 
pair  of  old  women  at  work  by  a  new-made  grave, 
burying  what,  on  examination,  proved  to  be  a  lemon 
skin  stuffed  with  human  hair.  The  hair  was  that  of 
the  victim,  who,  his  enemies  hoped,  would  waste  as 
the  fruit  decayed,  and  whom  the  buried  dead  would 
draw  to  death.  The  widespread  magic  of  envoute- 
jnent,  which  hurts  or  kills  by  wounding  or  melting 
a  wax  image,  is  a  capital  case  under  the  same 
theory.  Yet  here,  too,  the  wax  should  contain  iiair  or 
nail-parings  of  the  subject  ;  for  the  magic  of  imita- 
tion ultimately  depends  on  that  of  sympathy  or 
association,  and  can  do  nothing,  it  is  thought,  till 
first  a  true  rapport  be  established. 

Now  if  it  be  asked,  Where  does  imitation  play  a 
real  and  undeniable  part ;  when  does  it  first  become 
of  real  use  to  man  ?  the  answer  still  points  to  the  wood, 
and  to  the  woodland  life  of  the  hunter  and  fisher.  No 
one  can  touch  the  secret,  or  win  the  profit,  of  such 
life  save  in  the  way  that  teaches  him  to  become 
what  he  pursues.  He  studies  his  quarry,  keeps  its 
hours  and  mimics  its  voice  and  habits  ;  often  forced 
to  crawl  like  a  beast  on  all-fours,  or  to  cover  himself 
with  the  skin  of  the  animal  he  hunts.  If  he  is  bird- 
ing  he  finds  the  use  of  a  decoy;  the  first  taxidermist 
worked  to  this  end  that  a  stuffed  skin  might  take 
the  place  of  the  animal  that  once  wore  it.  The 
fisher  learns  the  same  lesson  of  the  lure  ;  learns  to 

C 


34  Florence  Past  and  Present 

imitate  in  one  way  or  another  that  on  which  the  fish 
feed.  All  this,  then,  is  the  doctrine  of  the  image ; 
as  yet  confined  to  the  world  of  real  fact  and  proved 
experience,  but  ready,  once  the  magical  idea  enters, 
to  pass  these  limits  and  to  become  the  working 
theory  of  the  strange  practices  we  have  just  noticed. 

There  is  an  intermediate  stage  which  connects  the 
real  with  all  such  developments,  and  it  is  to  be 
found  in  the  magic  dances  of  certain  savage  tribes. 
These  often  imitate  the  gestures  and  movements  of 
the  bird  or  beast  on  which  the  tribe  chiefly  depends 
for  nourishment.  Thus  the  Gilyaks  of  Siberia  use 
a  bear-dance,i  and  in  Australia  the  black  men  at 
their  feast  act  a  pantomime  in  which  they  imitate 
the  birth  and  first  movements  of  the  insect  that 
supplies  them  with  food.-  It  seems,  on  the  whole, 
pretty  plain  that  such  dances  must  at  first  have  been 
merely  the  school  of  practice  in  which  boys  learnt, 
in  company  with  experienced  men,  the  movements 
of  the  wild  game — the  secret  of  an  approach  that 
would  not  disturb  the  quarry — and  that  only  there- 
after did  the  matter  develop  under  the  magical 
doctrine  into  a  supposed  means  of  securing  success 
by  mere  imitation  without  further  trouble. 

We  have  visited  Siberia  and  Australia  only 
because  the  stage  these  countries  still  represent  has 
dropped  out  in  Tuscany,  but  even  here  there  is  a 
surviving  superstition — that  of  the  lupo  mannaro,  or 

'   Fra/.er,  Golden  Bougli,  ii.  j).  3S1.  "  Ibid.,  i.  p.  24. 


Food  and  Magic  35 

were-vvolf — which  can  hardly  be  explained  without 
viewing  it  in  the  way  to  which  these  foreign  facts 
lead  up.  The  lupo  mannaro,  one  must  explain,  is  a 
man  like  any  other,  who  is  subject,  however,  to 
occasional  fits  of  sheer  and  dangerous  madness,  in 
which  he  wanders  by  night  and  attacks  with  savage 
cries  those  whom  he  meets.  I  have  known 
of  one  who  confessed  to  thus  becoming  'a  wolf 
from  time  to  time,  and  asked  that  the  door  should 
be  kept  shut  against  him  if  he  appeared  in  this 
abnormal  state.  Such  would  probably  be  described 
by  an  alienist  as  a  case  oi  folic  circidairc  in  which 
sanity  alternates  periodically  with  a  state  of  delu- 
sion, followed  by  one  of  violent  mania.  When  sane 
the  lupo  mannaro  is  as  other  men  ;  when  delusion 
comes  he  imagines  himself  a  wolf,  while  the  acute 
mania  at  once  impresses  others,  and,  perhaps,  may 
partly  persist  in  his  own  memory  to  give  strength 
to  the  delusion  when  it  recurs. 

Still,  when  all  this  is  said,  there  is  some  difficulty 
in  accounting  for  the  number  of  cases  in  which  delu- 
sion takes  this  particular  form,  and  even,  it  would 
seem,  remains,  so  as  to  influence  the  succeeding 
violence  and  give  it  bestial  character  ;  unless,  indeed, 
the  solution  now  to  be  proposed  approve  itself  as 
likely.  Insanity  sometimes  has  the  effect  of  undo- 
ing generations  of  civilisation  and  setting  the 
madman  back  for  the  moment  where  his  primitive 
ancestors  once  stood  ;  it  may  even  awaken  inherited 


J 


6  Florence  Past  and  Present 


habits  no  one  could  have  suspected.^  As  the  lupo 
mannaro  is  confessedly  insane,  may  it  not  be  that 
something  of  this  has  happened  in  his  case?  In  his 
madness,  then,  he  would  simply  '  play  the  wolf  as 
his  remote  kind  once  did  in  the  woods,  and  his 
violence  awaken  and  use  the  same  skill  that  they 
learned  in  some  deliberate  and  concerted  wolf-dance. 
It  may  be  so;  if  it  be  so,  then  the  lupo  mannaro 
repeats  in  our  own  day,  unconsciously  and  involun- 
tarily, one  of  the  earliest  devices  of  the  hunter's 
magic,  the  wood-magic  of  imitation  ;  and,  so  doing, 
carries  us  back  to  the  life  and  habits  of  the  first 
inhabitants  of  the  Val  d'Arno. 

^  See  Preface,  p.  vii-i\. 


CHAPTER  III 

EARLY   TRADE 

Taking  up  once  more  the  thread  of  histor}-,  we  find 
the  hunters  and  fishermen  of  Tuscany  at  the  point 
where  they  are  about  to  become  something  else. 
They  have  covered  and  exhausted  the  country  of 
the  woods  and  the  streams  ;  it  can  yield  them  no 
more,  and  still  they  multiply  and  increase.  The 
inevitable  change,  one  sees,  when  it  comes,  will 
take  place  under  the  pressure  of  actual  want. 

Whither  will  they  turn  ?  On  the  north  are  the 
farmers  of  Lombardy,  on  the  south  the  shepherds  of 
Latium.  This  neighbourhood  will  not  tempt  the 
hunter  or  the  fisherman  to  become  a  farmer  or  a 
shepherd,  but  it  will  do  better,  for  it  opens  to  the 
men  of  the  woods  and  the  streams  a  new  way  of  life 
in  which  their  past  need  not  be  forgotten :  a  true 
development  where  their  knowledge  and  faculty  will 
have  full  play.  Remaining  themselves,  they  will 
gain  fresh  occupation  and  new  prosperity  by  becom- 
ing what  nature  and  history  have  destined  them 
to  be. 

37 


J 


8  Florence  Past  and  Present 


They  are  henceforth  to  be  traders,  nor  is  it  diffi- 
cult to  see  how  easily  and  naturally  they  must  have 
passed  into  the  new  life  that  alone  lay  open  to  them. 
The  process  of  change  began  on  the  border-line 
where  the  hunter  and  fisher  were  in  contact  with  the 
farmer  and  shepherd  ;  began  in  the  barter  to  which 
such  a  situation  easily  lent  itself.  The  winters  are 
cold  in  Latium  as  in  Lombardy,  and  fur  is  the 
warmest  winter  wear,  lighter  and  warmer  even  than 
sheepskin.  Though  the  summers  are  hot,  the 
climate  does  not  suit  the  sugar-cane,  and  were  it 
not  for  the  honey  that  the  wild  bees  have  stored  in 
the  trees,  man,  with  his  sweet  tooth,  would  never 
know  the  taste  of  sweetness.  But  so,  it  is  the 
men  of  the  woods  alone  who  have  the  secret  of 
both:  this  delicate  warmth  and  no  less  delicious 
sweetness.  They  track  the  wild  bee  to  the  robbing 
of  his  honey,  and  when  they  have  killed  and  skinned 
the  fox  or  the  badger  their  wives  know  the  cunning 
art  of  preparing  the  peltry  till  the  skin  of  these  furs 
is  as  soft  as  their  pile  is  light  and  warm.  Envy, 
then,  on  the  part  of  the  farmer  and  shepherd,  and 
offers  of  much  grain  and  cheese  in  exchange  for 
such  clothes  and  dainties  ;  with  the  result  that  the 
hunter  along  the  border  begins  to  follow  the  game 
not  entirely  on  his  own  account,  and  so  enlarges  his 
ideas  of  life. 

Another  stage  in  the  process  of  evolution  soon 
follows.      On    the   one    hand,   game    thus    pursued 


Early  Trade  39 

with  new  meaning  and  keenness  becomes  scarcer  all 
along  the  border-line  ;  retreats  before  these  hunters 
already  half-traders.  On  the  other,  their  kin  in  the 
heart  of  the  country  begin  to  envy  those  who, 
through  barter  with  the  farmer  and  shepherd,  are  no 
longer  entirely  dependent  on  the  flesh  of  game  for 
food,  but  can  vary  their  diet  with  grain  and  cheese. 
Hence  an  arrangement  useful  to  both,  whereby  the 
skins,  honey,  and  chestnuts  of  the  interior  come 
down  to  the  border-line  where  barter  goes  on,  and 
from  it,  correspondingly,  the  grain  and  cheese  of  the 
lowlands  move  up  from  hand  to  hand  through  the 
forests  and  along  the  river  banks.  Thus  the  process 
of  transformation  comes  to  affect  the  whole  forest 
people,  and  Tuscany  is  again  one  at  the  higher  level 
of  life  which  the  movement  of  commencing  trade 
has  established  here. 

One  more  step  completes  the  process.  These 
forest-dwellers  are  in  touch  and  friendly  relation 
with  the  farmers  of  the  north  and  the  shepherds 
of  the  south.  The  idea  of  exchange  has  taken 
possession  of  their  minds.  The  moment  cannot, 
then,  be  long  delayed  when  barter  will  become  trade 
in  its  higher  stages.  The  Tuscans  will  see  a  new 
future  open  before  them  as  a  link-people,  the  agents 
of  communication,  and  of  the  transfer  of  goods, 
between  the  south  and  the  north  and  back  again. 
Thus  shepherds  and  farmers  will  exchange  their 
surplus    cheese    and    grain    with    each   other    across 


40  Flortence  Past  and  Present 

country,  and  the  Tuscan  will  act  as  the  carrier  in 
this  true  commerce. 

Observe  the  exact  nature  of  this  further  change. 
The  Tuscan,  we  suppose,  is  still  paid  in  kind  as  in 
the  days  of  mere  barter,  but  what  he  now  sells  is 
not  this  fur  or  that  honeycomb  but  his  skill  and 
pains  as  a  carrier.  His  past  as  a  mere  hunter  or 
fisher  is  now  bearing  its  highest  fruit.  The  Tuscan 
hill-country  is  not  an  easy  one,  but  these  are  the 
men  who  know  it  like  the  palm  of  their  hand. 
Their  hunting  paths  run  everywhere  among  the 
thickest  woods,  and  even  pass  the  Apennine,  joining 
one  valley  to  another  across  the  great  watershed. 
The  fishers  know  the  streams  in  drought  as  in 
flood :  their  easy  and  difficult  reaches  ;  and,  where 
transport  by  water  will  help,  the  fisherman's  canoe 
is  at  the  service  of  the  new  traffic.  Thus  hunter 
and  fisher  alike  become  traders  and  carriers,  without, 
as  one  might  say,  ceasing  to  be  themselves.  This 
change,  in  short,  is  a  true  development  in  which 
commerce  and  all  its  consequences  keep  hold  still 
of  a  remoter  and  ruder  past. 

One  of  the  first  of  these  consequences  must  have 
been  the  domestication  of  the  animal  best  able  to 
help  the  new  venture.  The  farmer,  one  supposes,  had 
already  his  ox,  without  which  any  deep  cultivation  of 
the  rich  Lombard  plain  must  have  been  impossible. 
The  shepherd  of  Latium,  to  exist  at  all,  must  have  his 
flock    and    herd.      The   Tuscan    himself,  even   as    a 


Early  Trade  41 

hunter,  probably  knew  and  used  the  trained  faculty 
of  the  dog  in  following  game.  It  was  only  natural, 
then,  that,  become  a  carrier  and  man  of  commerce,  he 
should  seek  in  a  like  direction  the  help  he  now  needed, 
and  furnish  himself  with  the  horse  as  a  beast  of 
burden. 

The  process  was  probably  a  gradual  one,  and 
there  is  even  some  little  evidence  of  the  lines  on 
which  it  moved.  Wild  horses  of  a  small  and  hardy 
breed  may  be  supposed  indigenous  in  the  Maremma, 
where,  small  and  hardy,  they  run  half-wild  still. 
But,  according  to  good  authority,  mules  were  the 
earlier  beast  employed  in  carriage.^  We  are  thus 
obliged  to  think  of  domestication  as  beginning  with 
the  ass,  and  proceeding  in  some  custom  of  spring 
freedom,  in  which  these  animals  were  turned  out  to 
graze  by  the  sea,  with,  as  its  result,  the  mingling 
of  the  two  races  in  a  state  of  nature.  The  final 
step  would  thus  be  the  domestication  of  the  horse, 
with,  probably,  an  intermediate  stage  in  which  he 
was  already  caught  and  kept,  but  only  that  he 
might  more  conveniently  serve  as  a  sire.  And 
the  end  was  that  the  trader  had  an  animal,  whether 
mule  or  horse,  fit  to  answer  his  need  and  do  the 
heavy  work  of  transport  under  his  guidance. 

At  this  point  is  born,  of  the  beating  of  these 
hoofs,   the  road  ;  the    second   great   element   in   the 

^  Ft;s(i/s  (ed.  Miiller),  p.  148.  SeeW.  W.  Fowlei's  /Cowan  FesiiTa/s, 
p.  208,  to  which  I  am  indebted  for  this  reference. 


42  Florence  Past  and  Present 

being  and  prosperity  of  Florence.  To  study  this 
is  to  find  oneself  sensibly  advanced  in  the  long  way 
that  leads  to  the  first  foundation  and  later  prosperity 
of  the  place  with  which  we  are  chiefly  concerned. 
Florence  lived  by  the  road  no  less  than  by  the 
river  ;  it  is  in  the  combination  of  these  two  elements 
that  we  shall  find  her  seat  determined  and  her 
prosperity  assured. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  see  along  what  line  this 
combination  will  chiefly  occur  in  Tuscany.  The 
roads  will  run,  speaking  roughly,  north  and  south, 
for  the  traffic  that  creates  them  is  that  between 
Lombardy  and  Latium.  But  the  river  of  Tuscany, 
the  Arno,  flows  across  country  from  east  to  west 
in  its  lower  course ;  why,  we  have  already  seen. 
Thus  the  brown  roads  lie  parallel  like  the  warp 
threads  in  some  mighty  loom,  and  across  these 
nature's  shuttle  has  drawn  a  single  weft  in  the 
line  of  the  lower  Arno — yellow  when  it  flows  in 
flood,  and  green  again  as  soon  as  the  river  rains 
are  over.  It  is  here  then,  by  the  Arno  bank,  where, 
point  below  point,  the  roads  meet  the  river  at  right 
angles,  that  the  combination  of  these  two  great 
elements,  the  land  and  the  water-way,  arises  inevit- 
ably, ready  to  be  the  cause  of  further  change  and 
development. 

Can  these  important  points  be  more  closely  de- 
fined and  determined  ?  They  are  crossing-places, 
and   we   may  therefore  feel   sure  that  they  will  lie 


Early  Trade  43 

in  each  case  just  where  the  passage  of  the  river  is 
easiest.  Now  we  know  enough  of  the  lower  Arno 
to  say  something  about  the  distribution  of  such 
conveniences.  The  river  course  is  not  uniform  or 
regular  here.  It  is  interrupted  by  the  gorges  which 
the  water  has  cut  through  the  ridges  of  the  hills, 
and  where  the  stream  flows  narrowly  and  steadily, 
while  between  gorge  and  gorge  the  Arno  slackens 
and  spreads,  wandering  in  many  divided  and  re- 
current channels  over  the  level  of  the  marshy  plains 
that  were  once  wide  lakes. 

So,  after  all,  it  is  nature  itself  that  determines 
the  crossing-places,  which,  in  their  turn,  attract  the 
roads  and  fix  the  lines  by  which  they  will  approach 
and  pass  the  stream.  There  is  no  attraction  on 
the  level  where  the  Arno  runs,  shallow  indeed  but 
uncertainly,  here  to-day,  elsewhere  to-morrow,  and 
where,  besides,  the  approach  to  it  must  lie  over 
marshy  and  impossible  ground.  Passage  will  be 
rather  sought  and  found  at  the  gorges,  where  the 
sure  ground  of  the  hills  falls  steeply  to  the  stream, 
confining  it  to  a  constant  bed.  Here  the  Arno 
runs  at  its  narrowest  without  wandering ;  and  its 
depth  and  force  need  not  hinder,  for  here  the  fisher 
with  his  boat  is  ready  and  anxious  to  act  as  ferry- 
man, and  so  take  part  in  the  new  enterprise.  Thus, 
to  him  above  all,  the  gorge  became  of  the  first 
importance ;  the  river  gates  were  those  by  which 
he  passed  into  his  new  and  higher  life  as  a  partner 


II 

THE  TRADE  ROUTES 


_     Roads 

Rivers 

._.    Coast  lines 

1.  Aniina  (Florence) 

2.  Golfolina 

3.  Gil-one  and  Candeli 


Aulla 


TYRRHENE      ] 
\ 

i 

\ ^- 

x 

\ 

SEA  \ 


,  Lucca 


'-'0  > 

'^Artimiiio 

Pisa 

0 

Fucecchio 

-'^v 

■p,,iio'"    ■•■  '■■■., 

) 

oVolterra 


J.W.  Brnwii  del. 


Spina ! 


Emerj' Walker  sc. 


46  Florence  Past  and  Present 

in  the  great  trade  movement  that  had  aheady  trans- 
formed his  neighbour  of  the  wood  and  chase  into 
an  efficient  carrier.  Like  the  hunter,  he  may  have 
begun  by  dreaming  dreams  about  the  tree  ;  he  had 
his  own  reasons  to  do  so,  for  it  was  the  tree  that 
gave  him  his  boat.  But  now  in  the  magical  change 
that  transformed  his  Hfe,  the  river  gates,  the  gorge, 
surely  played  the  principal  part ;  strong  as  the  death 
that  waited  him  in  their  dark  stream,  yet  on  the 
whole  beneficent  and  altogether  wonderful.  We 
shall  meet  later,  and  in  several  forms,  this  sure 
passage  of  the  Gorgo  into  mythology,  and  trace  its 
long  survival  in  the  valley  of  the  Arno ;  for  the 
moment,  it  is  enough  to  have  seen  how  early  and 
how  naturally  the  superstition  arose,  and  with  how 
great  a  moment  its  birth  was  connected. 

Returning  then  to  the  road,  one  sees  that  nature 
here  not  only  laid  down  in  the  gorges  the  places 
where  it  might  most  easily  pass  the  river,  but  also 
provided  on  the  same  line  the  best  possible  approach 
to  such  crossings.  For  the  gorge  lies  where  the 
river  cuts  through  a  range  of  hills,  and  thus,  on 
ground  both  dry  and  high,  along  the  hill-ridges 
themselves,  the  roads  will  run,  avoiding  the  soft 
ground  in  the  valleys,  and  led  by  the  trend  of  the 
hill-system  to  just  the  places  where  the  Arno  may 
most  easily  be  passed.  Now  we  know  that  in 
Tuscany  the  hills  tend  to  run  north-west  by  south- 
east, and  on  this  line,  therefore,  the  roads  will  come 


Early  Trade  47 

from  the  south  to  meet  the  Arno.  Once  the  river 
is  passed,  however,  the  same  roads  will  tend  sooner 
or  later  to  break  back,  for  if  the  lower  Po  is  to  be 
reached  from  Latium  the  main  Apennine  must  be 
crossed,  and  this  implies  ultimately  a  north-east 
line  for  the  roads. 

This  is  the  moment  when  such  a  theory  of  the 
traffic  lines  may  be  fitted  to  the  country  about 
Florence  with  the  view  of  seeing  what  actual  results 
it  will  give  in  this  neighbourhood,  and  how  far  these 
correspond  with  known  facts.  Probabilities  are  very 
well  in  their  way,  one  must  often  begin  with  these, 
but  their  highest  use  lies  in  the  light  they  throw  on 
the  real  meaning  of  what  is  certain  :  the  facts  that 
can  be  adduced  to  prove  them. 

Two  fixed  points  in  the  course  of  the  Arno  lie 
near  Florence,  the  one  below  and  the  other  above 
the  city  ;  we  know  them  already,  for  the  upper  is 
the  gorge  of  the  Girone  and  the  lower  that  of  the 
Golfolina,  by  which,  respectively,  the  river  once 
entered  and  left  the  great  lake.  Of  these,  the  latter 
offers  a  natural  crossing-place  to  traffic  coming  from 
the  high  ground  of  Siena  and  the  Chianti,  for  the 
road  here  will  pass  by  the  hills  of  the  Pesa  to  the 
Golfolina,  and  thence  follow  the  Monte  Albano, 
breaking  back  at  Serravalle  for  Pracchia,  and  so 
reaching  the  great  plain  at  Bologna  by  the  valley 
of  the  Reno.  The  other  suits  those  coming  north 
from  Arezzo  by  the  Apparita  ;  the)-  will  cross  at  the 


48 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


Girone  and  rise  to  Fiesole  on  the  same  line,  break- 
ing back  at  this  nearer  point  to  pass  the  Olmo,  cross 
the  Mugello,  and  take  the  pass  of  Casaglia  for  Faenza 
and  the  mouth  of  the  Po  ;^  thus  reaching  the  same 
northern  plain  by  another  route.     There  is  evidence 


.MimA,  ,„...    . 

-«.:.       -^S^^^^p^r^ 

^g 

Wgm'^ 

'  .....^ 

% 

M. 

.  .  ^m 

m: 

W 

NEAR    BORGUNT(J  ;    THE    GIKONE    KOAl.)    RISING   TO   THE    PASS 


at  hand  ready  to  prove  beyond  doubt  that  these  two 
roads  were  actually  used  in  early  times,  but  in  order 
to  appreciate  its  value  and  meaning  the  reader  him- 
self, like  the  roads   he  has  just   followed,  must   be 

'  A  (le[i()sil  founil  near  Fiesole  and  represented  in  the  collection  of 
Dolt.  A.  C.  (jary;iolli,  Florence,  contained  examples  of  the  a^j  marked 
with  the  fish-bone  sign,  which  seems  to  indicate  that  the  Spina  traffic 
used  this  road.  See  Preface,  p.  ix,  and  R.  riarnicci,  /.c  Moiwle,  Part  I., 
(1S85),  p.  S  (Plate  X.,  No.  3). 


Early  Trade  49 

content  to  break  back  a  little.  We  must,  in  short, 
find  here  a  new  approach  to  the  whole  subject. 

It  may  be  supposed  evident  that  the  first  men  in 
the  Arno  valley  must  have  reached  this  seat  from 
the  east.  This  general  conclusion  need  not,  oi' 
course,  imply  that  they  came  hither  overland  from 
the  Adriatic  shore — a  difficult  and  therefore  unlikely 
approach  which  would  involve  the  passage  of  the 
high  Apennine  at  a  point  where  no  considerable 
route  has  ever  run.  It  is  much  more  likely  that  in 
the  last  stage  of  the  journey  these  immigrants 
travelled  up  from  the  Tyrrhenian  sea  by  Pisa  and 
the  river  itself,  )'et  it  can  hardly  be  doubtful  that 
their  point  of  departure  lay  somewhere  to  the  east 
of  Italy,  and  that  they  came  to  the  Arno  in  the 
course  of  that  general  westward  movement  of  peoples 
which  in  early  times  carried  civilisation  with  the 
moving  sun  from  shore  to  shore  of  the  Mediterranean. 

Now  this  human  movement  was  not  continuous 
nor  at  once  complete  ;  it  proceeded  by  successive 
waves  as  population  rose  in  distant  centres  and 
demanded  from  time  to  time  a  fresh  outlet ;  it  sent 
westward  swarms  of  a  different  kind  too,  with  an 
ever  higher  culture,  as  civilisation  matured  in  the 
great  eastern  fuciiuu  gentinui.  And  ever,  as  before, 
Italy,  like  all  the  western  lands,  sifted  out  these 
swarms  according  to  the  varying  opportunities  she 
offered  here  and  there  in  her  long  peninsula. 

The  first  arrivals  here  must  have  been  those  of 
D 


50  Florence  Past  and  Present 

mere  explorers,  on  the  outlook  for  new  lands  to 
shelter  and  support  them.  As  time  went  on,  how- 
ever, trade  between  settlement  and  settlement,  be- 
tween the  eastern  home  of  the  race  and  its  colonies 
that  spread  ever  westward,  became  the  moving  power 
that  prompted  wandering,  and  made  these  scattered 
nations  one  along  every  sounding  shore ;  binding 
them  in  a  new  unity  of  Mediterranean  peoples  and 
culture. 

So  one  sees  the  effect  that  must  have  been  pro- 
duced at  this  stage  by  what  had  taken  place  in  the 
central   Italy  we  are  chiefly  studying.     In  Tuscany 
the   first  arrivals  had  of  necessity  lived  the   life   of 
hunters  and  fishers,  but  later,  at  the  call  of  a  new- 
need,  had  become  cross-country  traders.     So  when 
new  arrivals  on  the  outlook  for  commercial  oppor- 
tunities   reached     Italy,    whether    they    touched    its 
shores  at  the  mouth  of  the  Po  or  on   the  opposite 
Tyrrhenian  coast,  they  found  a  cross-country  trade 
already  on  foot  fit  to  pass  on  their  sea-borne  goods 
from  one  harbour  to  the  other,  and  from  sea  to  sea, 
by  way  of  Tuscany.     Nay,  they  found  people  here 
at    the    same    stage   of   culture   as   themselves,   who 
could  understand  their  ideas  and  forward  them,  who 
would  even    perhaps   accept   their  persons  and  find 
a  place  for  them  up  country  on  the  trade  routes,  or 
at   least  admit  their   passage   on   what  was  rapidly 
becoming  a   highway  of  commerce.     For  remember 
that    the    shape    given     by    nature    to     Italy,    and 


Early  Trade  5 1 

especially  the  length  of  this  peninsula,  was  not 
without  its  meaning  here.  Even  the  twin  extremes 
of  Calabria  and  Apulia  made  themselves  favour- 
ably felt  in  Tuscany  ;  their  southward  reach  in  the 
Ionian  sea  making  the  periplits,  and  still  more  the 
conveyance  of  goods  all  the  way  by  water,  a  lengthy 
and  doubtful  affair  as  compared  with  their  trans- 
port by  the  shorter  overland  route.  But  this  route 
crossed  Tuscany,  and  Tuscans  as  carriers  and  traders 
were  the  gainers  by  such  a  natural  advantage. 

Now  of  this  stage  in  the  commercial  development 
of  the  country  the  roads  we  have  noticed,  and 
roughly  traced,  present  certain  evidence.  Taking 
first  that  which  crossed  at  the  Golfolina,  coming 
from  Siena  towards  Pistoia,  we  find  that,  here  and 
there,  it  is  marked  by  stations  yielding  deposits  of 
high  antiquity  and  interest.  Castellina  in  Chianti 
is  one  of  these,  so  is  Argiano  near  San  Casciano. 
Artimino,  which  commands  the  crossing,  seems,  as 
one  would  expect,  to  have  been  a  place  of  consider- 
able importance  ;  it  was  here  that,  in  175  i,  accident 
led  to  the  discovery  of  certain  ancient  urns  sealed 
with  pitch  and  supposed  to  have  contained  gold  ;  as 
the  like  good  fortune  had  already  brought  to  light 
near  the  same  place  a  large  deposit  of  small  figures 
thought  to  be  idols,  and  a  bull  in  bronze  finely 
modelled.^  But  Colle  di  Val  d'Elsa — a  point  easily 
connected  with  the  same  route — has  the  distinction 

^  G.  Lami,  Lezioiii,  p.  438. 


52  Florence  Past  and  Present 

of  furnishing  the  highest  proof  at  once  of  its  import- 
ance and  of  the  race  and  dawning  culture  of  those 
that  moved  in  it.  On  a  site  now  uncertain,  but  near 
the  Badia  all'  I  sola,  there  was  found  in  1698  a  shaft 
tomb,  since  closed  and  lost.  It  contained  ashes  of 
the  dead,  and,  on  three  sides  of  the  shaft,  a  painted 
alphabet  and  syllabary  which  Lepsius  has  pronounced 
to  be  Greek,  or  early  Pelasgic.^  Now  as  a  school- 
boy trick  is  not  to  be  thought  of  in  so  solemn  a 
situation,  only  one  moment  can  be  conceived  to  have 
produced  such  a  record  ;  that  of  the  first  invention 
of  letters,  or  rather  the  time  when  the  miraculous 
discovery  was  new  to  Tuscany  and  still  surrounded 
by  a  halo  of  divine  mystery.  Then,  and  then  only, 
could  the  bare  alphabet  have  seemed  a  iit  decora- 
tion for  the  tombs  of  the  dead  :  the  great  victory 
written  over  against  the  great  defeat.  It  would 
seem,  too,  that  trade  had  directed  the  discovery 
and  the  course  of  commerce  brought  it  hither  from 
the  East.  The  alphabet  of  Colle  with  its  eastern 
analogies  seems  to  prove  what  we  have  already  seen 
reason  to  suspect ;  the  presence,  movement,  and 
settlement  of  foreigners  from  Greece  and  the  Levant 
on  these  Tuscan  trade  routes. 

One  might  draw  further  and  wider  conclusions 
from  the  tusks  of  ivory  found  in  early  dwellings  near 
Fucecchio  ;  ^    they   seem   to   show    that   some   trade 

'   .///;/.  hi.  Cory.  Arch.  (Roma,  1836),  vol.  viii.  p[).   186-203. 
■^  Laini,  op.  cit.,  p.  328. 


Early  Trade  53 

across  the  Sahara  was  already  on  foot,  and  that  the 
moving  commerce  in  the  Mediterranean  basin  had 
begun  to  pick  up  such  things  at  Tunis  or  Tripoli, 
where  the  caravan  routes  touched  the  sea,  and  to 
carry  them  still  farther  north  and  westward.  But 
this  is  of  less  importance  than  the  signs  that  await 
notice  on  the  second  road,  and  at  the  crossing  just 
above  Florence.  We  have  seen  how  this  route  came 
from  Arezzo  and  climbed  by  a  point  not  far  from 
Fiesole  to  the  pass  of  Casaglia  in  the  high  Apennine, 
and  are  now  to  ask  what  traces  it  may  show  of  early 
occupation  and  use. 

Here  there  is  no  need  to  dig,  or  to  seek  treasures 
underground  ;  the  signs,  though  ancient  and  eloquent 
as  those  of  ihe  Golfolina  road,  lie  in  spoken  language 
and  are  to  be  found  in  the  place-names  that  still  dis- 
tinguish the  line  we  have  just  traced.  The  passage 
of  the  Arno,  for  instance,  where  this  road  crosses  it  at 
the  Girone,  shows  the  name  of  Candeli,  still  given 
to  a  village  by  the  stream.  Now  Candeli  is  pure 
Greek,  and  corresponds  to  the  Kanyteldeis  of  Cilicia, 
meaning,  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other,  the  town 
of  the  river  gorge — a  name  that  describes  the  natural 
characteristics  of  both  sites,  and  that  is  derived  from 
the  root-words  XA,  XAA,  XAXA,  to  open  or  gape. 
Colle  taught  us  that  the  alphabet  came  hither  from 
Greece,  but  Candeli  does  more,  for  it  tells  that  in 
early  times  there  must  have  been  settlers  on  this 
trade  route  who  spoke  Greek  as  their  mother  tongue, 


54 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


and  who  lived  long  enough  here  to  name  their  settle- 
ment as  Greek-speaking  people  would  naturally  do. 

It  is  even  possible  to  trace  the  matter  further  yet. 
Scholars  tell  us  of  a  tongue  older  still,  which  is  only 


KTRUSCAN    VVALI,   OF    FIKSOI.F.    ABOVF.    BOROUNTO 


preserved  in  certain  scattered  words  contained  in 
Greek,  as  fossils  are  found  embedded  in  later  rock.^ 
The  distinguishing  mark  by  wliich  these  pre-Greek 
words  are  known  is,  they  say,  the  occurrence  in  them 
of  the  combination  )tt  or  ;////,  as  in  the  names  of 
Corinth  and  Zacynthus,  or  the  words  viintha,  mint, 
ox plintJios,  a  brick.      Now  sucli  names,  showing  this 

'  See  Kretschmer,  I'linlnilimg  (Gottingen,  1896),  pp.  305-31 1,  and 
the  Annual  vi{  \\\ti  liritish  School,  Athens,  viii.  ji.  155. 


Early  Trade  55 

very  combination,  are  found  at  intervals  alon^  the 
road  we  are  studying;  which  indeed  they  serve  to 
define  very  exactly.  Just  below  the  pass  of  the 
Apparita  lies  Antclla,  and  just  beside  Fiesole,  where 
the  road  finds  a  natural  gap  in  the  hill,  and  com- 
mences its  north-eastern  course,  is  Borguiito,  while 
near  the  highest  point  of  all,  in  the  Apennine  of 
Casaglia,  it  passes  Ronta,  to  reach  the  summit  level 
and  the  last  watershed  between  the  Arno  and 
the  Po. 

Thus  it  would  seem  that  the  road  had  been  known 
and  long  used  by  the  people  that  spoke  the  iit  lan- 
guage. It  is  not  yet  sure  who  these  were,  but  it  may 
be  possible  to  see  something  of  the  western  move- 
ment under  which  for  a  time  they  found  their  dwell- 
ing and  occupation  here.  Zacynthus  (Zante)  is  an 
island  whose  very  name  brings  evidence  that  such 
men  once  dwelt  there.  Now  both  PHn\'^  and  Strabo 
tell  us  that  Zacynthus  was  the  mother-land  of  a 
great  and  famous  colony  in  Spain  ;  that  Saguntum 
(Murviedro)  whose  name  not  only  shows  the  signifi- 
cant ///,  but  corresponds  so  closely  in  form  with  our 
Borgunto  by  Fiesole.  There  is  thus  a  high  proba- 
bility that  the  nt  names  found  on  the  trade  route 
near  Florence  mark  a  distinct  stage  in  the  western 
migration  from  Zante  to  Spain,  when  the  emigrants 
sojourned  and  traded  here.  But  Pliny  and  Strabo 
both    refer    the    foundation    of    Saguntum     to    the 

'  Natural  History,  xvi.  40. 


56  Florence  Past  and  Present 

fourteenth  century  B.C.,  and  thus  for  the  first  time 
we  are  able  to  relate  the  early  life  of  the  Val  d'Arno 
to  histor\-,  and  establish,  roughly,  the  date  1500  B.C. 
as  that  of  the  nt  names  here,  and  of  the  international 
commerce  to  which  they  bear  such  important 
witness.^ 

^  The  Rutuli  seem  to  have  taken  part  in  tliis  movement,  though  in 
a  way  not  easy  to  tlefine.  It  is  said  they  were  later  arrivals  at  Sagun- 
tum  from  their  seat  at  Ardea  on  the  coast  of  Latium.  Lanzi,  Sagi^io, 
ii.  p.  374,  cites  the  form  Rnthle  from  a  rude  urn  preserved  at  Siena, 
which,  if  applicable,  would  give  the  sign  of  the  7ith  to  this  people,  and 
would  suggest  that  Ardea  may  have  been  the  halting-place  of  one 
swarm  from  Zacynlhus,  just  as  Borgunto  surely  was  of  another.  It  is 
worth  notice,  too,  that  the  Rutuli  have  left  their  name  not  far  from 
Florence,  at  Fonte  Rutoli,  on  the  high  ground  between  the  Chianti 
and  the  \'al  d'EIsa,  near  Castelliiia. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE    SITE    AND    ITS    POWER 

Between  the  roads  just  described,  a  little  lower 
than  Candeli,  a  good  deal  higher  than  the  Golfolina, 
lies  the  site  of  Florence,  and  the  relation  here  is 
not  merely  local  or  geographical  ;  Florence  enters 
at  once  and  deeply  into  the  earl)-  commercial 
system  of  which  these  neighbouring  lines  of  traffic 
speak  so  eloquently.  No  study  of  details  is  needed 
to  show  this,  and  these  we  may  therefore  defer 
considering  for  the  moment.  The  very  being  of 
Florence  as  a  city,  its  bare  beginning  as  a  village, 
is  enough  to  prove  the  connection  ;  for  the  gathering 
of  men  in  such  community  is  a  new  fact  which 
clearly  belongs  to  human  life  in  its  commercial 
stage  and  development. 

The  hunter  and  fisher  live,  as  we  have  seen,  in 
scattered  huts  set  here  and  there  among  the  woods 
and  by  the  streams ;  constrained  by  the  life  they 
lead  to  this  natural  separation.  But  alread\-  in 
Tuscany  a  change  has  come,  and  a  large  part  of 
the   population    has   ceased    to    hunt  or  fish,  forced 


58  Florence  Past  and  Present 

by  its  own  increase  to  take  to  the  road,  and  to  earn 
a  new  livelihood  as  the  conductors  of  cross-country 
traffic.  Not  of  set  purpose  then,  but  in  obedience 
to  a  new  necessity,  their  once  scattered  homes  now 
assemble  themselves  in  villages  set  on  the  trade 
routes ;  which  villages,  when  the  conditions  are 
favourable,  tend  to  increase  by  the  attractions  they 
offer,  and  so  to  become  towns,  and  at  last  true 
cities  :  the  centres  and  capitals  of  the  new  com- 
merce. 

Consider  the  conditions  of  the  case.  The  trader 
trades  by  travel ;  his  first  capital  is  not  the  goods 
he  carries  but  liis  own  knowledge  of  the  country, 
and  of  the  best  and  quickest  routes  of  passage 
from  one  frontier  to  the  other  :  the  knowledge 
he  gained  when  he  was  still  a  hunter.  But  the 
country  is  wild,  and  what  he  carries  is  tempting, 
so  he  will  not  travel  alone  but  in  company,  for  de- 
fence and  safety.  The  new  life,  in  short,  leads  to  a 
co-operation  unknown  to  the  hunter  or  fisher,  save  in 
the  smallest  measure  and  on  the  rarest  occasions  ;  it 
begets  the  caravmi,  the  company  of  men  armed  for 
defence,  who  in  numbers  lead  loaded  beasts  along 
the  new  highroads  of  trade. 

This  combination  is  not  without  consequence. 
If  men  are  thus  to  act  together  for  common  defence 
time  gains  a  new  value,  as  it  gives  the  signal  for  such 
co-operation,  sounding  the  hours  of  departure  and 
of  arrival.     The  railway  would   be  an    impossibility 


y 


The  Site  and  its  Power  59 

without  the  time-table,  and  the  caravan  imph'es 
something  at  least  of  the  same  order  and  regulation, 
if  those  who  compose  it  are  to  meet  and  start 
together. 

But  clearly  place  is  nearly  as  important  as  time  in 
the  new  order  of  things.  Convenience  dictates  that 
if  men  are  to  start  in  numbers,  and  travel  together, 
they  shall  group  their  homes  about  the  starting- 
point,  and  build  lodgings  along  the  route,  where  at 
the  end  of  each  day's  march  they  may  spend  the 
night.  The  average  rate  of  the  caravan  en  route  will 
determine  the  distance  at  which  these  halting-places 
will  lie,  the  one  from  the  other.  Thus,  as  the  rail- 
way has  its  termini  and  intermediate  stations,  so  the 
road,  as  the  earlier  instrument  of  commerce,  calls 
villages  into  being.  And  as  to-day  the  occurrence 
of  a  junction  implies  a  station  of  greater  size  and 
importance,  so  we  may  be  sure  that  from  the  begin- 
nings of  trade  the  stations  set  where  they  belonged 
to  two  or  more  systems  of  roads  would  soon  have 
the  advantage.  Here,  above  all,  population  would 
gather,  and  the  village  soon  become  a  town  or  even 
a  city  under  the  operation  of  mere  natural  conveni- 
ence. Such  was  the  case  and  such  the  fortune  of 
Florence.  She  owed  her  being  and  prosperity  to 
the  place  she  occupied,  and  it  is  now  time  to  ex- 
amine that  singular  site  with  new  attention. 

At  first,  as  we  have  seen,  there  was  no  place  for 
man  here  ;  the  site  was  covered  by  the  water  that 


6o 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


lay  in  the  eastern  gulf  of  a  wide  lake.  But  the  very 
upheaval  which  brought  the  lake  into  being  deter- 
mined its  disappearance  by  laying  a  new  drainage 
line  across  it  from  the  Girone  to  the  Golfolina,  and 
as  the  infant  Arno  cut  down  the  latter  strait  the 
lake  drained   away  with   the  course   of  the  stream, 


THE    PLAIN    THAT    WAS    A    LAKE;    SEEN    FROM   BELLOSGUARDO 


leaving  wide  marshes  that  in  their  turn  tended  still 
to  disappear.  It  may  be  that  the  last  stages  of  this 
long  process  were  witnessed  by  man,  and  even  that 
human  effort  may  have  hastened  their  accomplish- 
ment. To  suppose  so  would  help  one  to  understand 
the  tradition  registered  by  Villani,  that  art  had  once 
aided  nature  here,  as  again  in  the  days  of  Castruccio 
art  promised  to  undo  the  past,  and  destroy  Florence 


BORGUNTO   AND    MUGNONE    VALLEY;    liTKUSCAN    PAVEMENT    IN    FOREGROUND 


The  Site  and  its  Power  63 

by  creating  the  old  lake  anew  against  an  artificial 
barrier  to  be  built  at  Signa. 

However  this  may  be,  the  natural  process  is  cer- 
tain, and  no  less  sure  is  the  double  part  played  in  it 
by  the  Arno,  which  not  only  cut  a  way  of  escape  for 
the  falling  lake,  but  by  the  alluvium  of  its  constant 
deposits  laid  firm  ground  where  Florence  should 
stand  and  spread.  These  deposits,  in  any  river, 
consist  of  lighter  and  heavier  particles,  the  latter 
tending  to  travel  less  and  fall  first.  Thus  the  eastern 
gulf,  at  the  mouth  of  which  the  city  stands,  must 
already  have  emerged,  dry  and  firm,  while  as  yet, 
westward,  wide  marshes  still  encumbered  the  way- 
ward stream. 

In  this  process  of  building  the  site  the  Arno  did 
not  act  alone.  Behind  Fiesole,  as  every  visitor 
knows,  the  ground  falls  steeply  to  the  Mugnone,  and 
the  hollow  valley  of  that  stream  has  a  tale  to  tell 
that  must  not  be  neglected.  Many  have  found  it  an 
admirable  background  for  the  stage  of  the  ancient 
theatre  on  the  hill  ;  few  have  considered  that  it  lies 
behind  a  wider  stage,  that  on  which  the  great  drama 
of  Florence  was  plajed,  age  after  age,  on  ground 
that  the  Mugnone  had  helped  to  lay  and  prepare. 
Yet  standing  at  San  Gallo,  and  noting  how  along 
each  viale,  as  well  as  in  front,  the  ground  falls  gradu- 
ally and  gently  to  the  Arno,  who  does  not  see  that 
Florence  is  built  on  the  Mugnone  delta,  and  that  the 
deep  hollow  of  that  valley  behind  Fiesole  is  empty 


64  Florence  Past  and  Present 

to-day  only  because  of  what  it  has  yielded  in  the 
remote  past  to  the  stream  that  drains  it :  the  sands 
and  gravels  that,  mingled  with  those  of  the  greater 
stream,  now  form  the  foundation  of  the  city. 

This  tributary  of  the  Arno  had  another  effect 
which  must  not  be  overlooked.  Issuing,  then  as 
now,  from  the  gorge  at  the  Badia  of  San  Domenico, 
it  once  flowed  untouched  by  art,  and  on  a  course 
which  seems,  speaking  generally,  to  have  brought  it, 
by  the  site  of  San  Marco  and  the  Canto  alle  Macine, 
to  skirt  the  little  hill  on  which  San  Lorenzo  is  built. 
So,  by  the  Borgo  and  past  Santa  Maria  Maggiore. 
the  Mugnone  found  the  line  of  Via  Tornabuoni  and 
kept  it  till  it  fell  into  the  Arno  at  the  Ponte  Trinita.^ 
Signs  of  this  natural  course  have  been  found  here 
from  time  to  time:  in  1565,  when  water  broke  out 
as  they  were  digging  the  foundation  for  the  column 
of  Piazza  Trinita  ;  in  1567,  when  a  strong  spring 
hindered  the  building  of  the  north  pier  of  the  bridge; 
and  still  more  lately  in  1H94,  when  the  old  river  bed 
itself  was  laid  bare  in  front  of  the  Church  of  Santa 
Trinita."  Now  such  a  confluence  could  not  take 
place  without  the  tributary  having  an  influence  on 
the  course  of  the  main  stream,  and,  as  we  know  the 
old  course  of  the  Mugnone,  we  arc  now  prepared  to 
see  what  its  force  and  burden  brought  about  where 
it  fell  into  the  Arno. 

1  Laiiii,  Lezioni,  ji.  377- 

^  Gaye,  Carteggio,  iii.  pp.  62,  27 1  ;  and  Milani,  Rcliqiiic  (1895),  p.  55. 


The  Site  and  its  Power  67 

The  greater  river  was  here  pushed  southward  by 
the  stream  that  came  from  the  north.  In  the  upper 
angle  between  them,  their  mingled  deposits  tended 
to  gather  and  rise  high,  and  this  bank  of  gravel, 
which  remained  untouched  till  it  was  dug  away  in 
1368/  pinned  the  Arno  against  the  opposite  hill  of 
San  Giorgio,  as  in  a  narrow  strait  where  it  must  pass, 
and  from  which  it  could  not  wander.  One  thinks  of 
the  snake  caught  and  held  down  in  the  cleft  stick  of 
the  charmer,  for  while,  above  and  below,  the  Arno 
flowed  free,  ever  changing  its  course  under  the  law 
of  river  movement — witness  the  many  Bisariii  in 
the  upper  and  lower  plain  which  appear  in  docu- 
ments and  in  maps  of  the  district — here  the  river 
was  held  fast  between  the  more  ancient  barrier  of 
the  hill  behind  the  Via  dei  Bardi  on  the  south,  and 
that  nearer  wall  of  deposit  on  the  north  which  the 
Mugnone  had  brought  about  and  helped  to  build. 

Thus  then,  under  the  hill  of  San  Giorgio,  we  meet 
the  natural  fact  which  more  than  any  other  has 
determined  the  site  of  Florence.  We  have  seen 
already  the  value  of  a  fixed  point  in  the  course  of 
the  Arno,  and  how,  as  at  Candeli  and  the  Golfolina, 
it  determines  a  crossing,  and  draws  the  road  to 
itself  along  the  ridges  of  approach.  Shall  it  not 
then  be  the  same  where  Florence  stands,  and  with 
a  new  advantage?  For  while  a  true  mountain 
gorge  must  always  offer  difficulty  to  the  builder, 
^  Gaye,  op.  cit.,  i.  p.  521. 


68  Florence  Past  and  Present 

affording  only  a  scanty  site  on  a  steep  slope  or,  if 
that  slope  be  overpassed,  as  in  the  case  of  Artimino, 
forcing  him  to  build  on  a  hill-top  far  from  the 
stream,  and  only  reached  with  difficulty,  here  on  the 
contrary  is  a  fixed  point  with  a  wide  and  well- 
drained  site  ready  to  hand,  where  the  river  has 
heaped  its  gravels  on  the  plain,  and  the  tributary 


FLORENCK,  WITH    HILL   OK    S.    GIORGIO,  SICKN    FROM    BKLLOSGUARDO 

has  poured  them  far  and  near  over  a  gently  sloping 
delta,  fit,  as  time  and  history  prove,  to  form  the  site 
of  a  great  city. 

The  more  one  studies  the  place,  the  more  distinct 
and  convincing  does  its  advantage  seem.  The 
Mugnone  at  its  confluence  with  the  Arno  does 
more  than  bring  alluvium   with  it  ;   it  pours  water 


The  Site  and  its  Power  69 

into  the  greater  stream,  and  to  such  purpose  that 
this  is  the  point  at  which  the  navigable  course  of  the 
Arno  may  be  held  to  begin.  Thus  the  town  if  set 
here  commands  a  water-way,  very  important  in  early 
times  when  the  river  ran  much  fuller  than  it  now 
does,  and  one  that  joins  the  place  easily  with  Pisa 
and  with  the  open  sea.  A  iew  years  ago  they  found 
under  the  earth  and  the  modern  pavement  of 
^^lorence  the  remains  of  a  Roman  water-tank,  with 
the  statue  of  a  river  god  held  to  represent  the 
Arno.  But  the  tank  had  a  second  niche  for  another 
statue,  and  this  may  well  have  represented  the 
Mugnone.  One  hopes  it  did,  for  the  tributary  had 
clearly  as  much  to  say  as  the  main  stream  in  fixing 
the  site,  and  determining  the  prosperity  of  the 
place. 

From  water  to  land  is  but  a  short  step,  and  when 
we  turn  from  the  river  to  the  road  the  advantage  of 
Florence  in  her  site  becomes  still  more  apparent. 
The  ridges  of  Bellosguardo  and  Arcetri  lead  roads 
easily  and  on  firm  ground  to  the  fixed  point  of  the 
crossing  under  San  Giorgio,  so  that  the  southern 
approach  is  wide  and  sure.  From  the  opposite, 
northern,  bank  of  the  Arno,  nothing  is  simpler  than 
to  make  a  straight  and  short  connection  with  the 
Candeli  route  at  Borgunto — you  may  still  see  just 
how  it  was  done  by  tracing  the  old  road  down  from 
Fiesole  to  San  Domenico,  and  thence  by  the  ridge  of 
Camerata  to  the  Ouerce,  the  Via  degli  Artisti,  the 


yo  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Borgo  Pinti,  the  Via  del  Mercatino,  and  the  Via  dei 
Rustici.  Hence,  though  later  building  now  inter- 
venes, the  distance  to  the  Piazza  dell'  Arno  is  so 
short  and  the  direction  of  the  road  so  well  assured, 
that  the  Piazza  may  be  taken  as  fixing  the  place 
where  it  once  joined  the  river.  But  this  is  just  the 
fixed  point  in  the  Arno  we  have  already  found,  and 
if  a  boat  launches  to  leave  it  for  the  other  side,  it 
will  fall  with  the  current,  and  will  land  goods  and 
passengers  just  where  the  south  roads — the  Via  dei 
Bardi  in  both  branches,  and  the  Costa  San  Giorgio 
— join  to  meet  the  river  and  open  the  way  to  the 
south.  Thus  the  site  and  crossing  are  easily  in 
touch  with  the  Chianti  on  the  one  hand  and  with 
Borgunto  on  the  other ;  not  to  speak  of  the  Mugello 
and  far  Faenza,  to  which  the  road  from  Arezzo  by 
Candeli  and  Borgunto  ultimately  leads  over  the 
pass  of  Casaglia. 

The  most  important  pass  in  the  neighbouring 
Apennine,  however,  was  not  perhaps  that  of 
Casaglia,  but  rather  the  Futa,  which  opens  the  road 
to  Bologna;  for  near  the  site  of  this  city  stood  in 
very  early  times  the  great  settlement  of  Villanova, 
which  must  have  been  one  of  the  chief  places  where 
the  cross-country  trader  dealt  with  the  dwellers  in 
the  basin  of  the  Po.  A  glance  at  the  map  will 
show  how  well  placed  is  the  site  of  Florence  for 
direct  communication  with  this  northern  trade  centre. 
The     massif    of     Monte    Morello    offers     no     real 


The -Site  and  its  Power  71 

obstacle.  -One  road  rises  to  the  right  of  the  hiJi, 
alo|ig  the  ridge  of  the  Pietra,  and  ^nds  T3arl>eriTio 
di  Mugello  by  way  of  Vaglia  and  San  Piero  a  Sieve. 
The  other  keeps  to  the  left  and  the  Ipw  ground,  by 
Quarto  Ouinto  and  Sesto,  and  reaches  Barberino 
through  the  valley  of  the  M^-ina  above  Calenzano. 
From  Barberino  to  the  Futa  pass,  and  thence  by 
Pietramala  and  Loj^o,  the  road  runs  to  Villanova 
almost  as  straight  as  it  can  be  drawn,  though  the  main 
watershed  pf  the  Apennine  lies  between.  Thus  the 
easy  crossing  at  San  Giorgio  gathered  and  directed 
Ti>ads  that  joined  the  Lombard  plain  with  the  heights 
of  the  south,  and  ultimately  with  the  lower  valley 
of  the  Tiber  itself.  And  when  we  remember  that 
here  the  Arno  offered  its  own  western  water-way 
to  Pisa  and  the  sea,  the  result  of  all  these  advan- 
tages cannot  be  doubtful.  There  is  room  here,  by 
the  crossing,  for  a  village,  a  town,  even  a  great  city. 
And  the  city  will  be  great,  for  no  other  site  in  the 
neighbourhood  commands  and  combines  so  many 
trade  routes  and  opportunities. 

These  theoretical  advantages  of  the  San  Giorgio 
crossing  are  seen  to  be  real  when  one  comes  to 
examine  the  proofs  of  early  settlement  on  the 
Mugnone  delta,  and  to  trace  the  history  of  the  city 
thus  set  by  the  Arno.  In  1895,  when  foundations 
were  being  laid  for  the  buildings  of  the  new  centre, 
a  group  of  early  graves  came  to  light  where  the 
Gaffe    Gambrinus    now    stands.      The  cinerarv   urns 


72  Florence  Past  and  Present 

then  discovered,  and  now  preserved  in  the  Museum 
of  Via  della  Colonna,  were  of  distinct  Villanovan 
type,  and  beside  them  lay  a  bronze  fibula  that  spoke 
of  Greece  and  the  East,  so  clearly  ^gaean  was  the 
art  it  showed.^  Here  then  must  have  lain  a 
cemetery  of  the  earliest  Florence,  not  without  proof 
that  the  town  itself  was  in  touch  by  the  Futa  road 
with  Villanova,  and  that  south  and  seaward  it  lay 
open  to  the  same  eastern  influence  that  we  have 
already  remarked  in  the  neighbourhood  :  at  Candeli 
and  at  Colle.  The  story  is  consistent  then,  nor 
does  it  want  for  further  confirmation,  but  ere  we 
proceed  in  it  we  must  determine  more  accurately 
the  site  of  the  first  settlement  here.  The  '  Gam- 
brinus '  graves  have  given  us  the  cemetery,  but 
where  was  the  village  of  those  who  here  buried 
their  dead  ? 

The  fixed  point  in  the  Arno.  and  the  easy  cross- 
ing under  San  Giorgio,  mark  the  place  of  greatest 
advantage,  near  which  the  village  must  stand  if  it 
is  to  be  in  touch  with  the  ferry  and  command  the 
traffic  downstream  to  and  from  the  sea.  The  one 
danger  the  river  brings  to  human  habitation  on  this 
site  is  that  of  its  floods,  and  if  there  be  a  point  less 
exposed  than  another  to  the  inroads  of  water,  that 
point  will  be  chosen  for  the  settlement.  Now  we 
know  that  there  was  high  ground  close  by,  in  the 
angle   between    the    Mugnone    and    the    Arno,   just 

'   See,  for  tliis  Villanovan  (le[)osit,  Milaiii,  Reliqiiic  (1S95). 


The  Site  and  its  Power  73 

where  the  Via  dei  Rustici  runs  towards  the  river.^ 
If  we  suppose  then  that  the  first  village  stood  on 
this  bank  of  gravel  behind  the  Piazza  dell'  Arno,  it 
will  be  easy  to  show  that  no  other  situation  fits  so 
well  the  known  circumstances  of  the  case. 

This  site  lies  at  the  very  centre  and  meeting-place 
of  all  the  lines  of  communication  we  have  already 
traced.  To  it  falls  and  runs,  in  a  line  all  the  more 
impressive  because  so  straight,  the  road  from  Bor- 
gunto.  In  its  direct  approach  to  the  river  careless 
of  aught  but  speed,  this  road  would  seem  to  have 
found  its  line  before  a  building  of  any  kind  had  risen 
here  to  preoccupy  the  trader,  or  cause  him  to  change 
route  even  by  a  hair's-breadth.  It  is  true  that  as 
now  seen  in  the  Via  Torcicoda,  between  the  Via  del 
Mercatino  and  the  Via  dei  Rustici,  the  road  does 
bend  before  returning  to  resume  its  original  line,  but 
this  diversion  is  easily  explained  ;  it  has  occurred 
by  the  intrusion  here  of  the  Roman  Amphitheatre. 
Now,  as  it  is  certain  that,  had  this  building  been 
already  raised,  the  road  would  have  run  clear  of 
it,  we  must  suppose  rather  that  the  road  is  the 
older  of  the  two,  and  that  it  dates  from  pre-Roman 
days.  This  impression  is  confirmed  when,  remem- 
bering that  it  connects  the  Arno  crossing  with  Bor- 
gunto,  we  notice  that  part  of  the  road  still  bears 
the  name  of  Pinti.  For  thus  again,  as  on  the 
Candeli   route,   we   come   across    the    tracks    of   the 

'   See  above,  p.  67. 


74 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


strange  and  early  people  who  used  the  ;//  language. 
Plainly  they  were  busy  here.^  Theirs  may  have 
been  the  /Egaean  brooch  found  in  the  cemetery  near 
by,  and  certainly  we  cannot  do  wrong  in  taking  the 
line  of  the  Borgo  Pinti,  and  of  the  lower  streets  that 
carry  it  down  to  the  Piazza  dell'  Arno  and  the  riv-er, 
as  the  original  trade  route  _abDjj±  -the  "foot  of  which, 


PIAZ/.A    DKl    PKRUZZI  ;    CUKV|-.    OF    AMPHITHI-ATRK    ON    RIGHT 

on  her  high  bank,  Florence  first  began   to   live  and 
grow. 

What  is  perhaps  less  obvious,  but  certainly  not 
less  remarkable  when  observed,  is  that  the  road 
from  Sesto  tells  nearly  the  same  story  if  we  study 
it  carefully.      Here  the  first   matter  to  be  noticed 

'  II  is  worlh  iioiicc  iluit  Siiiiulliiiis  occurs  early  as  a  [>i()per  name  in 
Florence.      See  Lanii,  op.  c/t.,  p.  257. 


The  Site  and  its  Power  75 

is  that  of  direction  in  this  second  approach.  As 
the  road  runs  in  the  remoter  country  it  does  so 
under  a  natural  preoccupation  :  that  which  would 
lead  the  traveller  to  seek  firm  ground  on  the  first 
slopes  of  Monte  Morello,  and  so  to  avoid  the 
marshes  on  his  right  as  he  draws  near  the  river. 
This  accounts  for  the  windings  of  the  road  all 
the  way  from  Colonnata  to  the  Romito.  Taking 
it  up  now  from  the  other  end,  we  find  an  altered 
direction,  from  the  Piazza  Madonna  by  the  Via  della 
Forca,  very  natural  and  explicable  as  leading  to  the 
main  north  gate  of  Roman  Florence,  but  just  on 
that  account  to  be  held  as  a  later  diversion.  There 
remains  the  Via  Faenza  from  the  Fortezza  da  Basso 
to  the  Piazza  Madonna,  and  as  we  are  here  on  plain 
ground,  and  within  sight  of  the  journey's  end,  this 
street  may  be  taken  as  evidence  of  the  direction  in 
which  early  travellers  chose  to  reach  the  Arno  from 
Sesto.  Prolong  the  Via  Faenza,  then,  in  a  line  that 
cuts  straight  across  the  present  centre  of  Florence,^ 
and  what  is  the  result  ?  The  Sesto  road  reaches  the 
river  at  a  place  only  a  very  little  lower  than  that 
found  by  the  road  from  Borgunto,  Between  these 
two  points  then,  the  one  in  the  Piazza  dell'  Arno,  the 
other  in  the  Lung'  Arno  della  Borsa  near  the  Piazza 
dei  Giudici,  lies  the  probable  site  of  the  first  settle- 
ment, on  the  high  ground  near  the  river. 

^  Further  warrant   for   this  bold   conjecture  will   be   found   below, 
on  p.  1 10. 


Ill 

FLORENCE 

in  her  elements 

I.  Piazza  dell' Anio 

z.  Altafronte 

3.  Piazza  del  Vino  and 
Loggia  del  Graiio 

4.  Mercatiiw 

5.  Geniculum 

6.  Mercato  Vecchio 

7.  Piazza  V.  Emainicle 

8.  Piazza  deliolio 

9.  Amphitlieatie 


C   A   M   A   R  T   E 


I'MiieryM'alkcr  bc. 


78  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Observe  that  the  indication  furnished  by  the  Sesto 
road  is  as  ancient  and  authoritative  as  that  which 
Borgunto  has  already  given,  and  that  these  two 
routes  not  only  point  to  the  same  crossing-place  by 
the  river,  but  tell  a  like  story  of  forgotten  time.  On 
the  Sesto  road,  as  it  passes  Ouinto,  stands  a  villa 
called  La  Mula,  and  for  a  reason.  The  Tuscan 
people  of  this  neighbourhood  have  long  said  : — 

'  Tra  Quinto,  Sesto  e  Colonnata, 
Giace  una  mula  d'oro  sotterrata '  ; 

and,  in  fact,  the  villa  is  built  on  a  tumulus^  that 
covers  an  ancient  tomb  whose  spoils  of  gold,  when 
it  was  first  robbed,  live  no  doubt  in  the  local  rhyme. 
This  tomb  is  very  remarkable,  and  has  been  the 
subject  of  expert  study  which  assigns  it  to  the  sixth 
century  before  Christ.  For  our  present  purpose  it 
is  enough  to  note  that  it  reproduces  the  singular 
architecture  of  the  Treasury  of  Atreus  in  Greece, 
and  on  a  scale  of  size  which  may  fairly  compare 
with  that  of  the  better  known  monument.  The  road 
must  be  older  than  the  monumental  tomb  that  thus 
relates  itself  to  it,  and  the  traders  who  passed  on 
this  line  to  and  from  Villanova  were  at  one  time 
surely  in  touch  with  the  far  life  and  famous  art  of 
Mycenae. 

The  near  coincidence  of  the  roads  from  Borgunto 
and  Sesto  where  they  run  to  meet  the  Arno  at  so 
convenient  a  crossing-place  might  seem  enough  to 

^  La  Alula  may  be  a  corruption  of  this  mole. 


The  Site  and  its  Power  8 1 

fix  the  apex  of  this  V  as  the  true  centre  from  which 
Florence  developed.  But  there  are  other  reasons 
which  make  the  conclusion  still  more  certain.  One 
of  these  may  be  found  in  the  relation  of  the  sub- 
stantial markets — those  of  corn  and  wine  and  oil — to 
the  system  these  roads  describe.  P'or  the  Piazza 
deir  Olio — still  so  called — lies  just  off  the  line  we 
have  traced  for  the  Sesto  road  through  the  city, 
while  the  Piazza  del  Vino  and  the  Loggia  del  Grano 
lie  about  its  lower  end  where  it  reaches  the  river. 

Another  confirmation  may  be  found  by  crossing 
the  Arno  to  the  south.  We  have  already  seen  how 
such  a  passage,  under  the  power  of  the  river,  brings 
a  boat  and  its  load  to  the  very  point  where  the  three 
south  roads  draw  nearest  to  the  water  as  if  in  com- 
petition for  the  arriving  cargo.  But  this  is  not  all. 
Study  the  long  street  which  comes  up-stream  from 
Bellosguardo  and  the  west,  and  reaches  the  river 
here  by  way  of  the  Borghi  of  San  Frediano,  Santo 
Spirito  and  San  Jacopo.  One  would  fancy  that  the 
Ponte  Vecchio  would  be  its  object,  but  plainly  it  is 
not  so.  For  all  the  age  of  the  bridge  here,  which 
has  taken  the  place  of  one  built  by  the  Romans, 
perhaps  by  the  Etruscans,  on  the  same  site,  it  is 
not  in  correspondence  with  the  bridge  that  the 
road  runs.  It  gives  the  bridge  a  clear  go-by  and 
reaches  the  river  bank  somewhat  higher  up,  at  the 
very  place  so  often  in  question,  where  the  Costa 
begins  to  mount  the  hill  of  San  Giorgio,  and  the  Via 

F 


82  Florence  Past  and  Present 

dei  Bardi  draws  away  again  from  the  Arno  to  seek 
the  farther  slopes.  Here,  indeed,  on  the  south  bank, 
is  no  place  for  a  city.  The  ground  is  too  narrow, 
steep,  and  uncertain  ;  so  treacherous,  in  fact,  that  one 
half  of  the  Via  dei  Bardi  is  gone  where  it  meets 
the    hill,   and    the    blank    retaining    wall    bears    the 

words  : — 

'  Hiiius  Montis  aedes  soli 
vitio  ter  coUapsas  ne 
quis  denuo  restitueret 
Cosmus  Med.  Florentin. 
ac  Senens.  Dux  ii  vetuit 
Octohri  ciD.  D.  Lxv.'  ^ 

Not  here,  then,  but  across  the  Arno  at  that  point 
of  departure  with  which  this  landing-place  so  well 
corresponds,  are  we  to  seek  the  site  of  the  first 
houses  of  the  city. 

One  more  corroboration  may  be  added  to  what 
is  already  sufficiently  plain.  The  castle  of  Altafronte 
stood  in  the  Middle  Ages  on  the  high  ground — as 
its  name  indicates — where  Florence  first  rose.  Now 
we  know  from  the  chronicle  of  Villani  that  there 
were  still  some  in  the  historian's  day  who  held  that 
Altafronte  marked  the  site  of  the  Capitol  of  Florence. 
Villani  himself  will  not  have  it  so,  but  says  the 
Capitol  stood  westward,  at  the  Via  del  Campidoglio, 
where  indeed  its  ruins   were   found   in   the  late  ex- 

'  Kuin  is  kniiwn  lo  have  taken  place  here  in  1 2S4  and  again  in 
1547.  See  Aniinirato,  S/or.  I'lor.^  xxxiii.  ;  Manni,  Sigilli,  xxi.  ; 
ami  Tyastri,  Cvf.  Fim-..  viii. 


The  Site  and  its  Power  83 

cavations  for  the  new  Centre.  Yet  both  he  and 
those  he  reports  were  probably  right. ^  Altafronte 
stood  on  the  high  ground  where  Florence  began, 
and  if  her  Centre  shifted  so  that  the  Roman  Capitol 
came  to  stand  elsewhere,  these  are  matters  which 
concern  the  later  development  of  the  cit}-  and  not 
her  original  site.  Those  who  gave  such  importance 
to  Altafronte  had  the  tradition  of  an  older  truth, 
and  to  recover  this  to-day,  and  find  the  first  seat  of 
Florence  by  the  river  that  brought  her  life,  at  the 
crossing  where  the  roads  met,  is  to  begin  well.  The 
rest  is  but  the  long  story  of  a  growth,  age  after 
age,  which  carried  the  city  north  and  westward  from 
this  her  original  site  and  sure  point  of  departure. 

^  Certainly  worth  notice  too  in  this  connection  is  the  significant 
manner  in  which  Malispini,  recording  the  dwelling-places  of  the  most 
ancient  Florentine  families,  begins,  not  from  Mercato  Vecchio,  but 
from  San  Piero  Scheraggio  and  Borgo  dei  Greci.  See  R.  e  G. 
Malispini,  Storia.  cap.  lii. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE   DOUBLE    INHERITANCE 

It  is  plain  that  the  crossing-place  made  Florence, 
and  that  its  advantages  were  ready  to  secure  the 
development  and  progress  of  any  town  which  rose 
here.  Of  this  later  history  much  remains  to  be 
said,  but  before  entering  on  it  another  matter  de- 
mands some  attention.  Is  it  possible,  one  asks,  to 
know  anything  of  the  people  who  first  lived  here, 
and  to  trace  in  the  Florentines  of  later  times  and 
of  the  present  day  any  of  the  characteristics  of 
these  early  ancestors  ? 

Something  is  already  sure:  that  Florence  rose 
on  the  trade  route,  and  therefore  had  her  being  from 
the  first  as  a  town  begotten  of  commerce.  To  the 
truth  of  this  succeeding  time  has  borne  abundant 
witness,  for  Florence  has  never  forgotten  her  origin, 
and  her  greatest  days  have  ever  been  those  when 
her  trade  most  freely  flourished.  This  is  the  sense 
of  the  magniloquent  inscription  you  may  still  read 
in  the  choir  of  Santa  Maria  Novella: — 

84 


The  Double  Inheritance  85 

'  An.  MCCCCLXXXX,  quo  pulcherrima  Civitas, 
opibus,  victoriis,  artibus,  aedificiisque  nobilis, 
copia,  salubritate,  pace  perfruebatur,' 

nor  is  it  less  legible  in  the  decline  than  in  the  pro- 
sperity of  the  place.  The  history  of  Florence  thus 
appears  an  evident  unity,  but  we  have  yet  to  relate 
it  to  the  stor}'  of  the  Florentines. 

These  first  trailers  here  had  not  been  always 
such  ;  they  were  hunters  and  fishers  who  had  turned 
by  a  natural  necessity  to  the  ways  of  commerce. 
Their  characteristics  will  therefore  be  in  a  measure 
mixed,  for  the  oldest  life  of  all  will  not  die  in  these 
men  because  it  has  come  to  assume  a  new  form. 
The  survivals  we  are  to  expect  will  not  then  be 
pure,  but  will  bear  clear  traces  of  their  mingled 
origin  in  the  woodland  life  that  had  become  the 
life  of  the  road. 

Take  first,  as  truly  fundamental,  the  matter  of 
the  family.  With  hunters  the  family  is  a  narrow 
group,  early  formed  and  quickl)'  dissolved,  as  the 
children  grow  up  and  scatter  to  find  game  for 
themselves  without  poaching  on  their  parents'  pre- 
serves. Trade,  to  which  the  hunter  has  now  turned, 
will  call  these  lonely  households  together,  and  group 
them  afresh  in  villages  on  the  trade  route,  but 
cannot  be  expected  to  abolish  altogether  the  primi- 
tive instinct  of  separation  derived  from  the  wood- 
land life.  Florence  will  not  show  then,  at  least  in 
early  times,   the    patriarchal    family,   where    several 


86  Florence  I'ast  and  Present 

generations  inhabit  with  wives  and  children  the 
same  home.  This  is  the  type  of  life  proper  to  the 
shepherd,  and,  in  a  measure,  to  the  born  agriculturist. 
You  may  find  it  at  Rome  then,  or  among  the 
farmers  of  the  Po  valley,  hardly  by  the  Arno,  till 
times  late  indeed,  when  communications  have  become 
easy  and  have  worn  away  the  sharpness  of  original 
characteristics.  The  Florentine  will  live  close  to 
his  neighbours  and  his  kin,  for  trade  demands  this 
change,  but  he  is  still  himself,  and  will  live  his  own 
life  apart  from  theirs  in  a  house  of  his  own,  which, 
if  near,  is  yet  distinct  and  private,  the  peculiar 
dwelling  of  the  single  family  that  owns  and  occupies 
it.  Thus  Florence  rose  then,  a  town  indeed,  but 
one  built  of  small  and  separate  houses  :  of  wood 
and  thatch  no  doubt,  that  in  their  very  material 
they  might  recall  the  hut  of  the  hunter,  constrained 
to  no  such  neighbourhood  but  set  alone  among  the 
wide  spaces  of  the  forest. 

Even  when  the  Florentines  had  come  to  build 
in  stone,  the  manner  of  that  later  building  shows 
to  a  wonder  the  same  characteristic,  and,  here 
and  there,  remains  to-day  to  prove  it.  The  first 
Florentine  palazzi  were  not,  as  those  of  Rome, 
the  vast  dwellings  of  patriarchal  households  gather- 
ing many  branches  and  generations  within  the 
same  four  walls  of  massive  brick  or  stone.  At 
Florence  they  built  differently.  Each  family  had 
its   house;    each   house   was   a   self-contained   tower 


The  Double  Inheritance  87 

in  several  stories  ;  more  or  fewer  according  to  the 
means  of  the  builders.  There  was  grouping  indeed 
of  such  towers  as  the  kindred  grew  and  occupied 
a  whole  plot  of  ground,  tower  beside  tower,  till 
the  whole  was  girdled  about,  and  the  free  space  in 
the  centre  alone  remained  unoccupied  within  that 
singular  defence.  The  law  of  the  city  might  and 
did  interfere,  cutting  down  the  towers  to  a  uniform 
height  above,  and  causing  their  owners  to  cover 
the  whole  block  with  a  single  roof.^  Thus  the 
group  of  towers  became  a  palazzo,  but  who  does  not 
see  that  it  was  still  a  palazzo  after  the  manner  of 
Florence  and  not  of  Rome?  Under  that  roof  the 
towers  still  stand  distinct,  as  you  may  see  three 
of  them,  even  to-day,  at  the  east  end  of  Via  delle 
Terme ;  so  close  that  they  present  but  one  wall  to 
the  street,  and  indeed  seem  one  till  you  notice  the 
lines  of  perpendicular  division  between  them  that 
a  knife-blade  could  hardly  find,  yet  clear  enough  to 
give  the  Florentine  what  he  wanted  ever  since  he  lived 
alone  in  the  woods:  a  house  of  his  own  shut  within 
its  own  four  walls.  The  early  palazzi  of  Florence 
were  cities  in  miniature,  built  up  of  separate  homes 
as  the  city  is,  but  of  homes  in  still  closer  juxtaposi- 
tion ;  her  palazzi  are  the  city  in  the  essence  of  it, 
bearing  sure  witness  to  the  remote  history  and  funda- 
mental character  of  those  who  made  the  place. 

^   Under  tlie  law  of  1251.     See  my  Builders  of  Florence  {l^ondon: 
Methuen,  1907),  pp.  70-1:2,  for  a  fuller  discussion  of  this  mailer. 


88  Florence  Past  and  Present 

As  one  thinks  of  the  change  that  took  place 
when  the  hunter  became  the  trader,  it  appears  that 
such  a  new  venture  must  have  altered  and  extended 
the  value  of  human  life  in  no  small  degree.  The 
hunter  who  marries  early  ages  soon,  and  in  a  life 
where  children  scatter  betimes  and  the  family  tie 
is  loose,  the  ageing  find  themselves  at  a  great  dis- 
advantage, as,  with  dulled  senses  and  enfeebled 
strength,  they  compete  with  the  young  in  the  pursuit 
of  game.  To  the  trader,  on  the  other  hand,  a  new 
prospect  opens,  for  a  man  may  ride  the  road  when 
he  can  no  longer  walk  it ;  and  even  if  in  age  he 
choose  to  stay  at  home,  he  may  abide  there  as  the 
useful  and  honoured  master  of  counsel  and  director 
of  trade  ventures,  whose  past  experience  in  this 
way  of  life  has  a  value  that  years  and  the  decay  of 
bodily  strength  cannot  touch. 

So  it  would  certainly  seem  that  the  Florentine, 
originally  a  hunter  and  now  turned  to  the  way  of 
trade,  must  look  at  old  age  from  a  double  point 
of  view.  As  he  yields  to  the  suggestion  of  his 
remoter  past,  he  will  fear  the  coming  years,  and 
rudely  cheer  his  heart  in  scorn  of  all  who  are  yet 
older  than  himself.  As  a  trader  again,  and  in 
another  mood,  he  will  find  gentler  comfort  in  the 
praise  of  age,  its  wisdom,  and  the  counsel  it  draws 
from  a  ripe  experience. 

Now  these  are  just  the  contrasted  moods  we  find 
reflected  to-day  in  the  current  proverbs  of  Tuscany. 


The  Double  Inheritance  89 

'  Onora  il  senno  antico '  belongs  to  the  later  and 
gentler  class,  and  other  examples  of  this  attitude 
are  such  as  these  :  '  Tutto  cala  in  vecchiezza,  fuorche 
avarizia  prudenza  e  saviezza '  ;  '  un  asin  di  vent'anni 
e  pill  vecchio  di  un  uomo  di  sessanta'  and  '  chi 
barba  non  ha  e  barba  tocca,  si  merita  uno  schiaffo 
nella  bocca,'  while  the  earlier  and  ruder  lives  in  the 
sad  and  bitter  sayings:  'Chi  piu  vive  piu  muore  ' ; 
'e  piu  facile  arrovesciare  un  pozzo,  che  riformare  un 
vecchio,'  and,  worst  of  all,  '  a  testa  bianca  spesso 
cervello  manca,'  or,  'nella  vecchiaia  la  vita  pesa,  e 
la  morte  spaventa.'  Proverbs  like  these  may  be 
and  are  world-wide,  but  at  Florence  they  take  a 
deeper  meaning  than  ordinary  experience  can 
account  for :  they  represent,  in  their  sharp  contrast 
of  expression,  the  two  phases  of  life  through  which 
the  Tuscan  has  passed. 

From  proverbs  to  language  in  general  is  no  great 
journey,  and  it  may  be  worth  while  to  see  what 
effect  his  life  had  upon  the  Tuscan's  speech,  and 
what  survivals  of  the  remote  past  ma}'  be  found 
registered  still  in  its  peculiarity.  The  life  of  the 
hunter  and  fisher,  as  we  have  viewed  it,  will  surely 
tend  to  break  up  language  into  an  uncommon 
variety  of  dialect.  Everywhere  the  family  easily 
invents  and  adopts  a  '  little  language  '  of  its  own. 
This  is  the  first  step  to  dialect,  and  if,  in  our  modern 
experience,  the  matter  goes  no  further  than  such 
private  slang  for   home    consumption,  that  is   only 


QO  Florence  Past  and  Present 

because  families — even  those  who  never  open  a  book 
— now  live  in  such  close  intercourse  and  society  that 
together  they  form  a  standard  of  speech  and  keep 
each  other  true  to  it. 

But  in  the  forests  of  Tuscany  things  were  very 
different.  Not  only  was  there  no  literature — the 
great  check  to  dialect — but  there  was  no  society 
either,  in  the  modern  sense  of  the  word.  It  has 
been  said  that  among  the  Indians  who  hunt  and  fish 
in  the  vast  forests  of  the  Amazon,  there  is  a  dialect 
for  every  hundred  members  of  the  tribe.  One  has 
the  right  to  suppose  it  was  the  same  in  the  woods  of 
Tuscany  and  by  its  streams,  and  for  the  same  rea- 
son ;  the  hunters  and  fishers  were  so  scattered  and 
saw  so  little  of  each  other  tliat  there  was  the  least 
possible  check  on  these  natural  varieties  of  speech. 
The  matter  may  be  proved  and  studied  to-day  by 
the  curious,  for  it  has  left  a  direct  survival  at  Flor- 
ence. The  fishers  of  the  Arno  will  tell  you,  not 
only  that  their  talk  is  technical  and  peculiar  to 
themselves,  but  that  within  the  limits  of  the  city,  in 
the  short  distance  that  separates  the  Ponte  di  Ferro 
from  the  Ponte  Sospeso  -  not  more  than  a  mile  and 
a  quarter — a  trained  ear  can  distinguish  two  or  three 
dialects,  where  not  only  the  accent  but  even  some  of 
the  words  will  be  found  to  vary  from  point  to  point 
on  the  river.  If  it  is  so  still,  under  the  shadow  of  a 
great  city,  how  much  more  must  dialect  have  varied 
and  tltnn'ishcd   here  in   prehistoric  days,  when  as  yet 


The  Double  Inheritance  91 

there  was  neither  road  nor  town,  only  the  river,  the 
hill,  and  the  wood  held  by  the  scattered  famiHes 
they  harboured  and  fed  ?  ^ 

Now  if,  from  the  hunter  he  had  been,  the  Floren- 
tine was  become  the  trader,  grouped  as  never  before, 
alike  at  home  and  on  the  road,  this  can  only  mean  a 
victory  won  over  dialect  by  a  new  unity  of  common 
speech.  Nay  more  ;  if  the  trader  here  is  to  prosper 
by  learning  the  talk  of  Lombardy  and  I.atium, 
between  which  he  moves,  he  must  begin  by  reform- 
ing his  own  language.  Towards  this  linguistic  pro- 
gress, then,  each  age  brought  its  own  contribution. 
The  hunter's  life  was  responsible,  no  doubt,  for  the 
breaking  up  of  language  into  dialect  among  the 
loneliness  of  the  woods,  but,  on  the  other  hand,  it 
laid  a  foundation  for  the  opposite  process  that  was 
ready  to  commence  when  the  time  should  be  ripe. 
For,  by  necessity,  the  hunter  is  a  man  whose  ear 
and  voice  are  shrewdly  trained  by  the  life  he  follows. 
There  is  a  language  of  the  woods,  inarticulate 
indeed,  but  all-important  to  those  who  follow  the 
chase.  The  notes  of  the  birds,  and  the  voice  of  the 
deer  when  they  breed,  mean  much  to  the  hunter. 
They  not  onl}-  lead  him  where  game  lies,  but  his 
chief  art  is  found  by  imitating  them,  training  his 
throat  to  the  liquid  trill  or  whistle,  calling  reeds  to 

^  There  may  have  l)cen  a  leasun  for  this  survival:  'Among  some 
tribes  of  Western  \'icloria  a  man  was  actually  forbidden  to  marry  a 
vfiie  who  spoke  the  same  dialect  as  himself.' — J.  Dawson,  Aborigi)ics, 
quoted  by  Frazer,  Golden  Bough,  vol.  i.  p.  420  (2nd  ed.). 


92  Florence  Past  and  Present 

help  his  birding,  or  setting  a  blade  of  grass  between 
his  hands  to  mimic  the  bleat  of  the  fawn.  Thus  he 
spares  himself  many  a  weary  step,  not  content 
merely  to  follow  what  flies,  but  ambitious  rather  to 
call  the  game  and  find  it  come  to  his  feet.  Yet  who 
does  not  see  that  such  art  is  substantially  the  same 
as  that  in  which  men  teach  themselves  to  speak  a 
strange  language  as  well  as  their  neighbours  :  by 
listening  keenly,  remembering  long  and  exactly, 
and  imitating  constantly?  If,  as  we  must  suppose, 
the  Tuscan  trader  lived  by  learning  to  talk  well,  it 
is  plain  that  his  training  as  a  hunter  laid  the  foun- 
dation for  that  excellence  ;  he  came  to  his  great 
change  well  prepared  to  take  advantage  of  it. 

And  the  new  way  of  life  he  found  not  only  put 
him  under  the  necessity  of  using  a  common  lan- 
guage with  his  kin,  and  learning  the  speech  of  his 
neighbours  ;  it  gave  him  direct  help  to  both.  The 
great  agency  at  work  to-day  for  the  suppression  of 
dialect  is  the  conscript  army  :  the  meeting-place  of 
men  from  every  province  who  must  live  and  work 
together,  and  whose  society  and  service  give  promise 
of  an  Italy  not  merely  politically  one,  but  that  shall 
yet  be  united  more  closely  than  ever  by  the  bond  of 
a  common  speech  and  understanding.  So  must  it 
have  been  in  Tuscany  when  the  hunter  turned 
trader.  These  men,  once  scattered,  now  lived  and 
worked  together,  and  in  their  caravan  was  born 
almost   at  once — was  it  not  the  condition   of  tlieir 


The  Double  Inheritance  93 

life  now? — a  common  speech  in  the  suppression  of 
the  dialects  that  had  hitherto  divided  it.  So  Urdu 
arose  in  India  as  the  language  of  the  eastern  camp. 

We  have  seen  how  this  victory  over  dialect  had 
been  prepared  for,  and  may  be  sure  that  the  trained 
faculty  of  ready  imitation  that  secured  it  was  still 
ready  to  serve  the  trader  in  more  distant  fields. 
The  talk  of  the  borders  thus  came  up  country  not 
less  surely  than  the  grain  of  Lombardy  or  the 
cheese  of  Latium.  When  the  trade  routes  pierced 
these  provinces,  and  the  traders  reached  the  eastern 
or  western  sea,  the  new  world  of  language  that  every 
port  opened  was  but  another  opportunity  for  their 
formed  and  triumphant  facility.  The  strange  names 
we  have  found  left  by  strangers  on  the  Candeli 
route — Borgunto  and  the  rest — prove  that  these 
sojourners  by  the  Arno,  and  at  Florence,  had  no 
need  here  to  forget  their  own  tongue,  but  might  use 
it  freely  as  in  their  native  seat.  This  can  have  only 
one  meaning,  that  the  people  of  the  place  had 
learned  to  speak  it  as  well  as  they. 

Now,  on  the  whole,  it  will  be  difficult  to  find  any- 
thing that  more  clearly  and  wonderful!}'  represents 
the  past  in  the  Florence  of  to-day  than  just  this 
matter  of  language.  Not  the  survival  of  strange 
place-names,  or  of  any  particular  foreign  tongue  the 
Tuscans  may  at  one  time  or  other  have  learned  to 
speak,  but  something  deeper  and  greater  than  these: 
the  sheer  faculty  of  speech,  the  delight  in  its  skilful 


94  Florence  Past  and  Present 

use,  that  distinguish  the  Tuscan,  and  especially  the 
Florentine,  from  other  men.^  There  is  much  inter- 
provincial  jealousy  in  Italy,  and  the  Tuscan  has  at 
least  his  share  of  abuse  for  this  or  that  in  him  that 
his  neighbours  find  unpleasing,  but  if  the  talk  fall  on 
language  it  is  still  the  lingua  Toscana  that  all  unite 
to  praise,  and,  if  possible,  to  imitate,  conquered  in 
spite  of  themselves  by  the  rich  subtlety  which  fears 
no  rival  in  the  art  of  fitting  words  to  things  and 
expressing  the  thought  in  the  phrase. 

The  great  Florentine  poet  did  much  for  the  lan- 
guage, but  it  were  a  deep  mistake  to  suppose  that 
Tuscan  before  Dante's  day  was  a  mere  dialect  like 
any  other  form  of  Italian,  which  only  the  happy 
accident  of  his  birth  and  Muse  raised  to  the  place 
it  holds  among  the  great  languages  of  the  world. 
Tuscan,  like  any  other  tongue,  was  what  it  was 
because  of  those  who  spoke  it,  and  was  therefore 
originally,  inevitably,  richer  than  its  neighbours  as 
being  the  talk  of  men  whose  whole  training  and 
hope  made  them  masters  of  sound  and  of  speech  in 
a  sense  hardly  known  to  the  rest  of  Italy.  Quite 
apart  from  any  author,  even  the  greatest,  who  ever 
used  it,  Tuscan  was  thus  sure  of  the  supreme  place  ; 
born  to  it  from  the  remotest  {^ast  in  the  early  history, 
training,  and  faculty  of  the  Tuscans  themselves. 

'  Cf.  Taine,  of  the  Enyii-sli  :  'lis  ne  savent  pas  s'amuser  avoc  la 
parole,'  and  the  confession  of  F.  Co])j)ola,  '  L'artc  di  nudrirsi  di  parole, 
di  appas^arsi  di  parole,  di  incbriaisi  di  parole,  c  arte  senza  dubhio 
italiana.' —  7V//;////(?,   I4lh  .Vprile  1910. 


The  Double  Inheritance  95 

It  is  difficult  to  put  into  English  words  the  real 
nature  and  singular  effects  of  this  pre-eminence  as 
they  appear  in  the  common  talk  of  modern  Florence. 
To  speak  of  the  Florentine's  delight  in  language  is 
but  an  approach  to  the  central  truth.  This  delight 
is  born  of  a  sense  of  mastery  over  words,  and  joy- 
fully inspires  their  further  use  and  refinement. 
Strangers  have  sometimes  wondered  that  there  is  no 
game  proper  to  Tuscany  unless  it  be  Pallone,  and 
that  even  here  the  people  only  watch  and  bet  while 
professionals  play.  It  may  be  truly  said  of  the 
country  in  general  that  the  real  Italian  game  is  that 
of  word-play,  and  that  none  is  so  expert  on  this 
ground,  or  takes  such  delight  in  the  botta  e  risposta. 
as  the  Tuscan  :  the  Florentine.  It  gives  him  all  the 
sensations  of  keen  expectation,  watchful  interest, 
and  joyful,  successful,  entry  and  victory  that  others 
find  in  contests  of  physical  strength  and  skill ;  he 
feels  it  all,  but  finds  his  exercise  and  delight  on  the 
higher,  the  mental,  plane. 

Here,  then,  lies  the  genesis  and  perpetual  renewal 
of  the /rz's^^,  the  peculiarly  Florentine  jest.  Hum- 
our is  proverbially  untranslatable,  and  Florentine 
wit  is  the  least  likely  to  form  an  exception  to  the 
rule.  To  describe  its  form  is  nearl)'  as  difficult, 
though  here  something  may  perhaps  be  done  by  an 
analogy.  The  double  stopping  of  the  expert  vio- 
linist, and  his  art  of  creating  harmonics  that  are 
heard  above,  below,  and   behind  the  principal  notes 


96  Florence  Past  and  Present 

he  plays,  to  their  indescribable  enrichment,  may 
serve  as  figures  of  what  you  hear — or,  if  you  are 
inexpert,  more  frequently  miss — in  this  Florentine 
speech.  Every  phrase,  almost  every  word,  has  a 
meaning  beyond  the  common  and  the  obvious,  so 
that  seeming  rudeness  may  be  real  flattery,  or, 
more  frequently,  the  apparent  compliment  cover  a 
real  and  atrocious  attack. 

Some  of  these /"rz'c:^/  are  stereotyped  ;  they  live  in 
the  memory  of  all,  and  become,  as  it  were,  the  cards 
used  in  the  game :  phrases  and  replies  framed  of 
old  to  follow  each  other  in  a  common  sequence. 
But  just  as  the  shuffling  of  the  cards  implies  new 
combinations,  and  makes  the  game  one  of  oppor- 
tunity, so  the  accidents  of  life  and  intercourse  lend 
themselves  to  new  applications  of  the  old  material 
of  language.  Word-play  at  Florence  is  never  stale, 
ever  full  of  fresh  excitement  and  interest,  to  these 
masters  of  the  phrase.  The  victory  of  the  Tuscan 
tongue  has  been  won,  age  after  age,  on  these  playing 
fields,  and  the  faculty  which  enjoys  itself  there  still 
is  agelong ;  it  looks  back  to  the  life  of  the  wood- 
lands, and  to  the  new  necessity  brought  by  early 
trade  where  first  that  art  of  vocal  mimicry  found  its 
higher  application  and  more  enduring  fame. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   VILLE   AND   THEIR    RELIGION 

As  one  thinks  of  what  early  Florence  must  have 
been,  there  are  several  characteristics  so  probable 
here  that  they  deserve  notice,  quite  apart  from  any 
question  of  their  survival  in  our  own  day.  If  they 
existed  and  made  themselves  felt,  however  early, 
they  must,  of  course,  in  their  consequences,  have 
influenced  the  whole  succeeding  history,  though  to 
trace  their  effects  may  be  difficult,  if  not  impossible. 
For  the  present  purpose,  however,  it  is  enough  that 
we  see  them  in  their  relation  to  the  first  growth  of 
the  place,  encouraging  development,  and  even  laying 
down  the  main  line  which  brought  Florence  from 
the  village  she  was,  to  the  town  and  city  she 
became. 

In  opening  this  study  it  is  necessary  to  examine 
more  closely  than  before  the  Florentine  family.  The 
foundation  of  future  development  must  have  been 
laid  in  the  new  society  that  Florence  saw  :  in  the 
family  therefore,  transferred  from  the  woods  to  its 
new  seat  where  the  roads  met,  and,  one  cannot  but 

G 


98  Florence  Past  and  Present 

believe,  profoundly  influenced  by  this  change  of 
place  and  of  occupation.  Let  us  try  to  conjecture 
what  such  change  must  have  implied,  and  how  it 
made  itself  felt.  Florence  itself  was  from  the  first 
a  result  of  the  new  grouping  that  drew  men  together 
in  an  altered  way  of  life,  nor  is  it  likely  that  this 
should  not  have  affected  the  units  involved  in  it  ; 
those  lesser  ultimate  groups  which  were  the  families 
gathered  here.  How  did  they  differ  from  the  family 
of  the  hunter  or  the  fisher  ? 

To  say  that  they  were  traders  is  to  imply  more 
than  we  have  yet  observed.  The  way  is  long  from 
Lombardy  to  Latium,  and  the  roads  steep  and  rough 
that  lead  across  Tuscany  from  the  eastern  to  the 
western  sea  by  the  Apennine  passes.  If  we  add 
that  the  passage  was  not  altogether  safe  ;  that  it  lay 
through  the  woods,  where  wild  men  lingered  armed 
with  arrows  and  spears  in  the  fashion  of  the  former 
age  ;  and  that  the  hunters  who  had  taken  to  the  road 
and  its  trade  were  therefore  forced  to  travel  in  com- 
pany, and  use  their  old  weapons  in  a  new  defence,  it 
becomes  plain  that  these  journeys  could  not  fail  to 
produce  their  natural  effect  at  home — that  is,  in  the 
families  of  Florence. 

Time,  much  time,  is  necessary  for  such  expedi- 
tions. The  way  is  long,  and  the  caravan  moves 
slowly,  constrained  to  the  pace  of  the  weakest  mule 
and  the  worst  man.  Weeks  if  not  months  will  pass 
before  it  returns,  and  it  does  so  only  to  set  out  again 


The  Ville  and  their  Rehgion  99 

on  a  new  venture.  As  the  caravan  is  composed  of 
men  only,  the  conditions  imply  that  in  the  trading 
community  of  Florence  there  is  a  sharp  separation 
of  the  sexes.  The  men  are  on  the  road  most  of  the 
time,  while  the  women  stay  at  home  in  the  society 
of  their  own  sex,  and  those  of  the  other  who  are  too 
young  or  too  old  to  travel. 

Now  this  is  the  situation  which,  wherever  it 
occurs  in  the  world,  has  alwa}'s  and  naturally 
brought  about  that  constitution  of  the  family  and 
of  society  which  is  known  as  the  Matriarchaie. 
Where  the  husband  is  absent  from  his  wife  most  of 
the  year,  she  can  hardly  be  expected,  on  marriage, 
to  go  to  live  with  her  husband's  relations,  who  are 
comparative  strangers  ;  she  will  naturally  stay  with 
her  own  people,  whom  she  has  always  known,  and 
the  children  will  be  reckoned  as  belonging  to  the 
family  of  the  mother  and  not  to  that  of  the  father. 
If  the  hunters  come  to  combine  forces  in  the  chase, 
and  are  absent  from  home  much  of  the  time  in 
organised  bands,  the  Matriarchate  will  develop  even 
in  the  woods.  This  is  the  reason  of  its  occurrence 
among  American  Indians.  It  may,  therefore,  have 
been  known  in  Tuscany  even  in  the  first  period,  and 
in  that  case  the  association  of  the  hunter  in  com- 
panies would  precede  and  suggest  the  caravans  in 
which,  later,  he  began  to  travel  the  roads  in  pursuit 
of  trade.  However  this  may  be,  it  is  certain  that 
such  organised  absence  of  the  men,  whenever  it  came 


lOO  Florence  Past  and  Present 

about — and  therefore  in  the  period  of  trade,  if  not 
already  in  that  of  the  chase — could  only  result  in 
the  constitution  of  the  family  on  the  basis  of  the 
Matriarchate. 

It  is  evident  that  such  a  society,  where  descent  is 
traced  through  the  mother  rather  than  the  father, 
must  give  woman  a  position  of  uncommon  import- 
ance. But  the  case  of  Florence  is  such  that  we  can 
see  further  reason  why  she  should  here  have  enjoyed 
a  peculiar  independence  and  consideration.  In  the 
woods,  the  wife  of  the  hunter  had  spent  her  spare 
time  in  such  simple  tasks  as  the  curing  of  furs,  the 
clearing  of  honey,  and  the  plaiting  of  baskets,  and 
hers  therefore  were  the  products  that  passed  from 
hand  to  hand  in  that  first  barter  on  the  border  that 
led  up  to  true  trade,  and  changed  the  life  of  the  tribe. 
Now,  as  the  trader's  wife,  and  settled  at  Florence,  she 
has  more  time  still  on  her  hands.  When  the  men 
are  absent,  for  weeks  or  months  at  a  time,  the  women 
form  perforce  a  society  apart,  ply  their  tasks  in 
common,  and  learn  the  secrets  of  co-operation. 
Rivalry  between  these  workers  is  to  be  expected,  and 
leads  to  improved  results  in  the  output.  The 
curing  of  skins  becomes  the  tanning  of  hides,  the 
plaiting  of  willow  or  reed  the  weaving  of  flax,  and 
pottery,  once  made  casually  and  for  home  consump- 
tion only,  is  now  turned  out  with  new  art,  and  in  the 
quantities  that  trade  demands.  For  trade  rules  all 
at    Florence,    and    woman,    who    cannot    enter    it 


The  Ville  and  their  Religion  loi 

directly,  or  travel  the  roads  as  men  do,  works 
by  supplying  the  market  still  in  a  new  industry. 
Her  co-operation  and  organisation  at  home  answers 
exactly  to  that  of  the  men  on  the  road  and  in  the 
market.  She  has  an  assured  position  in  the  common 
venture  ;  may  acquire  property  in  right  of  her  contri- 
bution to  it ;  and,  if  her  produce  come  to  form  any 
considerable  part  of  what  the  caravan  carries,  the 
man  will  soon  appear  as  the  inferior  partner  in  the 
concern  :  the  servant  who  carries  goods  to  market 
and  sells  them  for  his  mistress  the  producer. 

Hence  a  probable  reaction,  tending  to  restore  the 
threatened  equilibrium  between  the  sexes.  Children 
trim  the  balance,  for  a  child,  whatever  its  sex,  may 
as  readily  take  after  the  mother  as  after  the  father. 
The  boys  who  take  after  their  mothers  will  despise 
the  road  and  show  aptitude  for  industry  at  home. 
Manufacture  will  enter  on  a  new  life  with  the  appear- 
ance of  these  stronger  hands  in  the  workshop,  and 
Florence,  beginning  as  a  mere  trading  centre,  will 
develop  as  the  seat  of  true  and  balanced  industry 
in  which  both  sexes  find  due  employment. 

Hitherto  we  have  seen  trade  transform  the  hunter 
into  the  carrier  of  goods,  and  industry  rise  in  a  very 
natural  way  to  meet  the  demands  of  the  market ;  it 
only  remains  that  we  should  touch  on  agriculture. 
For  farming  on  the  large  scale,  such  as  Lombardy 
knew,  there  was  neither  room  nor  need  in  the 
neighbourhood    of    early     Morence ;    her    life    was 


I02  Florence  Past  and  Present 

nearly  if  not  quite  as  alien  from  that  of  the  fields  as 
from  the  flocks  and  pastures  that  formed  the  riches 
of  Latium.  Yet  one  must  suppose  that  the  ground 
here  was  not  quite  left  to  itself,  and  in  trying  to  see 
how  culture  of  a  slight  sort  may  have  come  about 
near  Florence,  we  gain  a  valuable  clue  to  the  distri- 
bution of  the  population  here,  and  the  consequent 
direction  in  which  the  town  began  to  spread 
onwards  and  outwards  from  its  first  seat  by  the 
Arno  ferry. 

The  climate  of  this  valley  is  far  from  tropical, 
and  though  hot  in  summer  is  quite  cold  enough  in 
winter  to  make  fires  necessary.  The  hunter  had 
built  them  of  old  by  his  hut  in  the  woods,  and  the 
trader  will  not  be  content  in  his  new  home  without 
the  comfort  of  a  hearth  in  the  cold  season.  Thus 
quite  apart  from  the  wood  used  all  the  year  round  in 
cooking,  house  and  boat  building,  and  the  operations 
of  industry,  there  will  be  a  demand  for  winter  fuel  at 
Florence  which  the  neighbouring  woods  must  be 
sought  to  supply.  But  the  cutting  of  the  woods 
means  the  clearing  of  the  ground  about  the  town, 
and  even,  one  may  say,  the  ploughing  of  these  town- 
lands — thinking  of  the  pack-mules  yoked  to  the 
felled  tree  to  bring  it  home,  the  weight  of  the  trunk, 
and  the  furrow  its  butt  must  have  left  all  the  way 
from  the  wood  to  the  house.  Had  the  Florentines 
known  nothing  of  field  labour  before,  one  sees  that 
this  might  easily  have  been  their  introduction  to  it. 


The  Ville  and  their  ReHgion  103 

In  any  case,  the  town  must  soon  have  stood  in  a 
clearing,  and  the  natural  use  of  such  ground  must 
have  been  found  in  its  culture. 

As  tree-felling  proceeds,  however,  a  difficulty 
emerges,  for  the  woodland  is  always  moving  farther 
away,  and  the  transport  of  fuel  becoming  more 
troublesome.  This  difficulty  may  be  supposed  to 
act  in  the  following  way.  Under  it  there  will 
clearly  be  the  temptation  to  extend  Florence  per 
saltum,  by  dividing  it — that  is,  by  planting  a  new 
settlement  nearer  the  retreating  woods.  Thus,  as 
abandonment  of  the  ferry  is  not  to  be  thought  of 
since  its  trade  advantages  are  so  great,  we  get  the 
probability  of  a  double  community  here,  one  still 
clinging  to  the  old  seat  at  the  Piazza  dell'  Arno,  the 
other  set  towards  the  first  hill-slopes  on  the  north, 
and  between  them  nothing  but  the  clearing :  once 
woodland  and  now  arable  ground.  One  may  pause 
to  remember  that  this  is  just  the  stage  where 
Villani  takes  up  his  tale  of  Florence  :  in  the  twin 
Vzlle  of  Arnina  and  Camarte.  Arnina  one  supposes 
the  original  village  by  the  ferry,  and  Camarte  may 
have  lain  at  the  slopes  still  called  Camerata,  or  on 
some  height  of  that  plain  which  was  still  known  as 
Camarte  in  the  Middle  Ages,  where  the  Baptistery 
and  the  Church  of  San  Marco  both  stand  to-day.  In 
any  case,  the  second  village  must  have  lain  well  to 
the  north  of  the  Villa  Arnina. 

Now   with    the    cultivation   of   the    ground    there 


I04  Florence  Past  and  Present 

comes  by  necessity  a  new  conception  of  property  in 
it.  The  dwellers  in  the  woods  had  regarded  their 
solitudes  as  free,  the  common  hunting-ground  of  the 
scattered  tribe.  But  where  the  trees  have  fallen  and 
the  ground  is  given  to  culture  men  will  not  spend 
their  labour  on  it  unless  it  be  declared  their  own. 
Hence  the  necessity  of  division  and  appropriation, 
and,  in  the  particular  case  of  the  twin  village  here, 
of  a  border-line  traced  by  art,  and  itself  the  expres- 
sion of  some  new  law  that  gave  in  just  proportion 
to  Arnina  and  Camarte  the  whole  arable  ground 
that  lay  between. 

Arrived  at  this  point  of  probability,  some  proof  of 
what  has  been  reached  in  theory  now  becomes  an 
urgent  need,  and  must,  of  course,  be  sought  in  the 
region  of  survivals.  As  to  the  Matriarchate,  one 
might  point  to  the  case  of  a  great  Florentine  family, 
the  Adimari,  called  Nepotumcose,  Nepotecose,  or 
Nipotecosa,  as  the  descendants  of  a  certain  Cosa  di 
Litri ;  for  here  a  woman  appears  plainly  as  the  head 
of  the  house,  and  descent  is  reckoned  from  her.^  As 
to  the  rise  of  industry  in  the  co-operation  of  women 
left  to  themselves,  the  state  of  the  first  convents  at 
Florence  is  not  without  interest  and  significance.  It 
has  been  said  of  them  by  a  very  competent  author- 
ity that  they  were  erected  'solely  in  the  material 
interests  of  the  founder's  family,'  and  that  '  they 
assumed  a  religious  character  only  that  they  might 

'  Sec  Cosinu)  dclla  Kcna,  Sc-r/i'  (Hrenzc,  1690),  p.  33. 


The  Ville  and  their  Reh'orion  105 

enjoy  a  greater  security  and  higher  consideration,'^ 
Now,  in  the  ninth  century  A.D.,  two  of  these,  the 
convents  of  Sant'  Andrea  and  of  San  Michele,  were 
the  seat  of  industry,  where  women  Hving  in  the  close 
society  of  their  own  sex,  worked  at  the  loom.  The 
material  here  was  goats'  hair  or  the  wool  of  sheep, 
and  we  know  that  the  wool  came  to  San  Michele 
from  the  mother-house  of  Nonantola  on  the  other 
side  of  the  Apennine.  See  then  how  much  these 
facts  confirm.  Tuscany  affords  little  or  no  pasture- 
land;  the  wool  wrought  here  must  come  from  abroad. 
Florence  is  set  on  the  trade  routes  ;  her  people  are 
carriers;  nothing  is  more  natural  and  easy  than  the 
transport  which  brings  the  wool  from  Nonantola 
and  returns  it  by  the  same  hill-road  wrought  into 
cloth.  The  authority  who  brings  these  facts  to  our 
notice  is  no  doubt  right  in  saying^  that  here  we 
have  the  beginning  of  that  great  wool  trade  which 
was  later  to  build  the  best  fortune  of  Florence.  But 
clearly  there  is  more  to  be  said,  for  the  matter  looks 
back  as  well  as  forward.  This  convent  life,  religious 
only  by  accident  and  in  an  afterthought,  is,  one  may 
believe,  the  sure  survival  of  the  necessary  segrega- 
tion of  the  women  under  the  conditions  of  prehistoric 
trade  here.  And  this  industry  the  convents  sheltered 
was  a  survival,  too,  of  the  earlier  looms  and  natural 

^  Davidsohn,  .SVor/a  (Firenze  :  Sansoni,  1907),  vol.  i.  p.  131;  see  also 
pp.  102,    133. 

-  Ibid.,  pp.  134-135- 


io6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

co-operation  which  raised  household  tasks  till  they 
became  a  true  manufacture  for  which  trade  began  to 
act  as  the  carrying  and  distributing  agency. 

Now  the  Church  of  Sant'  Andrea  remained  to 
mark  the  seat  of  this  remarkable  survival  till  a  few 
years  since,  when  the  Centre  of  Florence  was  de- 
stroyed and  rebuilt.  San  Michele,  fortunately,  is 
still  with  us,  and,  as  Or  San  Michele,  is  one  of  the 
chief  attractions  of  the  city.  May  we  not  look  then, 
near  these  sites,  for  another  survival  in  equally 
substantial  form  ?  What  of  the  border-line  that  has 
seemed  so  likely?  May  not  Florence  be  expected 
to  show  some  sign  still  of  a  yet  more  significant 
survival  in  the  persistence  of  the  old  division  which 
once  separated  north  from  south  here  :  the  lands  of 
Camarte  from  those  of  Villa  Arnina? 

In  what  form  may  we  expect  to  find  it?  The 
doctrine  of  land  measurement  is  very  old.  It  comes 
to  us  from  the  Romans  as  the  work  of  the  '  Agri- 
mensores,'  but  the  Romans  say  they  had  it  from  the 
Etruscans,  and  indeed  the  matter  may  be  more 
ancient  still.  Now  amid  much  that  is  perplexing 
and  uncertain  two  things  surely  emerge  from  the 
confusion  found  in  the  Rei  Agrariae  Auctores,  and 
these  are,  first,  the  dependence  of  the  whole  art  upon 
the  sun,  which  in  his  rising,  southing,  and  setting, 
fixes  the  cardinal  points  for  men  who  have  no  other 
compass.  And  next,  the  constant  tendency  of 
every  border-line,  whether  it   run    north   and   south 


The  Ville  and  their  Religion  107 

or  east  and  west,  to  affirm  itself  in  a  road  ;  the 
limes  is  always  becoming  the  semita  or  the  via 
puilica} 

Now  in  the  case  of  Florence — that  is,  of  the  Villa 
Camarte  and  the  Villa  Arnina,  which  lay  north  and 
south  of  each  other — the  dividing  line  must  run  east 
and  west  between  them.  Wherever  Camarte  may 
have  stood,  Arnina,  one  may  feel  sure,  lay  at  the 
Arno  ferry;  about,  therefore,  and  behind  the  Piazza 
deir  Arno.  Thus  it  follows  that  the  border  will  lie 
to  the  north  of  this  point,  and  that  it  must  have  run 
east  and  west.  Is  there  any  sign  of  it  to-day  ;  any 
street  in  Florence  which  fulfils  these  conditions,  and 
which  may  be  held  as  the  survival  of  the  old  divi- 
sion }  If  any,  it  must  be  the  line  of  the  Via  Strozzi, 
the  Via  Speziali,  the  Corso,  the  Borgo  degli  Albizzi, 
and  the  Via  Pietra  Plana,  for  no  other  bears  the 
signs  of  which  we  are  in  search. 

The  line  in  question  clearly  belongs  to  a  new 
order  of  things.  The  roads  already  examined — the 
Via  Faenza  with  its  ideal  prolongation  across  Flor- 
ence to  the  Lung'  Arno  della  Borsa,  and  the  other 
member  of  the  V,  the  line  of  the  Borgo  Pinti,  the 
Via  del  Mercatino,  and  the  Via  dei  Rustici — are 
simply,  one  may  well  believe,  the  approaches  to  the 
river  ferry  found  by  ancient  travellers,  careless  of 
aught  but  speed,  convenience,  and  the  natural  con- 

^  See  the  yvt/.-i^rar/ize  ,-:/?<t/c7r<rj,  edited  by  W.  Goesius  (Amst.,  1674), 
p.  151  (Hyginus) ;  ed.  Lachmann,  Berlin,  1S48,  i.  p.  16S. 


io8  Florence  Past  and  Present 

ditions  of  the  ground  over  which  they  must  move. 
But  the  new  h'ne  which  crosses  these,  making  the  V 
an  V>  is  not  natural  but  clearly  artificial,  and  the  art 
betrayed  here  is  that  of  the  Agrimensor  in  its  rudi- 
ments ;  the  land  measurer  whose  first  preoccupation 
lay  in  the  use  of  the  sun  to  find  and  trace  an  east 
and  west  line.  No  such  east  and  west  line,  for  truth 
and  length  together,  is  to  be  found  at  Florence,  as 
may  be  still  seen  in  the  streets  just  named. 

As  soon  as  this  first  great  correspondence  is 
recognised,  many  details  crowd  to  corroborate  it, 
and  many  facts  show  themselves  in  quite  a  new 
light.  It  appears  that  the  boundary  road  ran  from 
water  to  water,  for,  as  the  first  course  of  the  Mugnone 
followed  Via  Tornabuoni,  so  in  old  times  the  Affrico 
— still  called  a  'river'  on  account  of  its  former 
importance — reached  a  point  marked  by  the  Church 
of  Sant'  Ambrogio,  at  the  end  of  the  Via  Pietra- 
piana,  before  it  fell  into  the  Arno.^  Thus  the  artifi- 
cial combined  exactly  with  the  natural  boundaries 
of  the  territory  here. 

Then  the  earliest  trace  of  human  occupation  at 
Florence  relates  itself  naturally  to  the  line  in  ques- 
tion. The  six  urn-burials  were  found  in  sand 
on  the  bank  of  the  Mugnone  a  little  north  of  the 
west  end  of  this  road.      If  one  is  right  in  taking  it  as 

^  In  this  neighbourhood  too,  between  S.  Ambrogio  and  the  Port'  alia 
Croce,  lay  land  called  ihc  ^^ori^'o,  perhaps  because  the  Affrico  once  fell 
into  the  Arno  at  this  place.  See  d.  Lanii,  Memorabilia,  pp.  1098, 
1099,  1 100,  and  Leziotii,  pp.  70,  105,  no,  384,  387. 


The  Ville  and  their  Religion  109 

the  boundary,  then   these  graves  were   part   of  the 
cemetery  of  Camarte. 

The  possession  of  property  has  always  drawn 
men  to  invoke  religion  as  a  sanction  and  defence  of 
their  rights.  The  compita  of  old  times,  perpetuated 
in  the  wayside  shrines  of  to-day,  served  a  double 
purpose:  as  boundary  marks  they  defined  property, 
and  as  temples  they  invited  worship  and  assembled 
the  neighbourhood  at  stated  times  for  its  perform- 
ance. The  fact  that  the  common  boundary  mark 
to-day,  as  in  ancient  documents,  is  the  tree — the 
cypress  or  other — strengthens  this  contention  rather 
than  weakens  it.  For  the  tree  had  beyond  all  ques- 
tion its  place  in  primitive  life  as  the  home  of  the  tree 
spirit,  and  the  use  made  of  the  cypress  still,  alike  in 
cemeteries  or  where  lands  meet  in  Italy,  is  but  one 
more  proof  that  though  the  woods  are  gone  the  life 
they  once  saw,  and  the  belief  they  once  inspired, 
have  left  their  traces  down  to  our  own  day. 

So  then  the  Florentine  boundary  road,  if  really 
such,  would  surely  attract  and  fix  the  religious 
thought  of  the  twin  community  it  divided  ;  would 
be  marked  by  shrines  and  hallowed  by  religious 
observances  from  the  day  when  it  was  first  traced. 
On  the  west,  the  cemetery  fixed  it  so  that  it  could 
not  be  changed  without  violating  the  graves  of  the 
dead.  By  what  further  sanctions,  in  what  concourse 
and  worship  of  the  living,  was  this  important  line 
secured  ? 


iio  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Two  points  in  this  east  and  west  line  are  evidently 
of  singular  importance  :  the  crossing-j^laces  where  it 
meets  the  roads  that  come  from  Sesto  and  Borgunto 
respectively.  These,  as  conipita,  may  be  expected  to 
gather  to  themselves  the  religious  sanctions  invoked 
to  hallow  and  preserve  the  boundary  line.  As  to 
the  first,  it  may  be  well  to  observe  that,  as  yet,  it  is 
for  us  merely  ideal  ;  the  situation  we  give  it  depends 
on  our  being  allowed  to  project  the  line  of  the  Via 
Faenza  across  the  city  to  the  Arno.  Now  here  a 
singular  circumstance  comes  to  confirm  the  boldness 
of  that  conjecture,  For  the  compituvi  thus  deter- 
mined coincides  exactly  with  the  situation  of  the 
pillar  which,  till  the  Centre  was  emptied  a  few  years 
ago  of  its  antiquities,  stood  at  the  corner  of  the  old 
market-place,  and  carried  the  statue  with  its  cornu- 
copia called  the  'Abundance'  of  Florence.^  Through 
the  centre  of  this  column  the  east  and  west  line  we 
follow  certainly  passed,  and  our  right  to  prolong  the 
line  of  the  Via  Faenza  as  we  have  done  is  strangely 

^  Vasari  says  of  it  :  '  In  Mercato  Vecchio,  sopia  una  colonna  di 
granito,  e  di  mano  di  Donato  una  Dovizia  di  macigno  forte,  tutta  iso- 
lata  ;  tanto  ben  fatta  che  dagli  artefici,  e  da  tutli  gli  eomini  intendenli, 
e  lodata  sommamente.  La  qual  colonna,  sopra  cui  e  questa  statua 
collocata,  era  gia  in  San  Giovanni,  dove  .sono  I'altre  di  granito  che 
sostengono  I'ordine  di  dentro  ;  e  ne  fu  levata,  ed  in  suo  cambio  poslovi 
un'altra  colonna  accanalala,  sopra  la  quale  stava  gia  nel  mezzo  di  (juel 
tempio  la  statua  di  Marte,  che  ne  fu  levata  quando  i  Fiorentini  furono 
alia  fede  di  Gesu  Cristo  convertiti.'  It  would  thus  seem  that  the 
tradition  of  Florence  carried  the  matter  back  to  the  first  centuries  of 
our  era,  and  associated  this  column  with  still  earlier  pagan  worshij). 
See  furtiicr  below,  ])[).   145-149,  382. 


MEKC'ATU    VECCHIU    AND    PILl.AK    OF    AHUNDANCE    ( I'holo  Aliiuui) 


The  Ville  and  their  Rehgion  113 

justified  v/hen  we  find  that  the  two  Hnes  coincide  at 
the  very  point  where  the  pillar  stood. 

Thus  the  first  religious  sanction  begins  to  appear 
on   the   boundary  line,  and  the  religious  history  of 
the   place  to  unfold   itself.     If  the  society  of  early 
Florence    was    constituted,    as    seems    likely,   under 
the  principle  of  the   Matriarchate,  then  these  people, 
like  those  of  the  East  who  followed  the  same  way, 
would    share    the    eastern    worship    of    the    mother 
goddess,  the   Ishtar  or  Cybele  as  she  was  called  in 
Babylon    and   in   Asia    Minor.      We    shall  yet  find 
other  proof  that  this  was  so ;   for  the  moment  it  is 
enough  to  notice  how  naturally  the  form  given  by 
man  to  his  deity  depended  on  the  conditions  of  his 
own   life,  and   how   much  reason   there   is   to   think 
that   at  this  compitmn  we  have  found   a  true   trace 
of  the  worship  proper  to  such  people  as  the  first 
Florentines    probably   were.      The  column   here   no 
doubt  represents  the  tree,  as  we  know  it  does  not 
far  off,  by  the  Baptistery.     The  cornucopia   which 
the   '  Abundance  '    held     is    equally    significant    of 
Fortuna,  whom  we  know  to  have  been  the  equiva- 
lent of  the  eastern  mother  goddess.     Her  place  on 
the  symbol  of  the  tree  enables  one  easily  to  identify 
her  with  the  '  donne  degli   alberi '  still   heard  of  in 
Tuscany.      Her    name,   the    )iia!n)iiola,    or    '  mother 
dear,'  is  given  to-day  at  Florence  to  her  flower,  the 
violet,^  and  her  sex,  surviving  the  greatest  religious 

'  Cf.  Dioscoridcs,  iv.  122,  who  calls  the  blue  violet  kvjUXlov. 
H 


1 14  Florence  Past  and  Present 

change  the  city  has  ever  seen,  has  remained  ob- 
stinately attached  to  this  site.  For  this  compituni, 
marked  of  old  by  the  goddess  on  her  pillar,  came, 
under  Christianity,  to  bear  the  shrine  and  figure 
of  the  Madonna  della  Tromba,  once  set  at  the 
corner  of  the  market  here,  and  now  seen  in  the 
Arte  della  Lana  where  it  looks  to  Or  San  Michele. 
So  much  for  the  primitive  Matriarchate  and  its  first 
consequences  at  Florence. 

It  is  a  pleasant  change  to  pass  from  the  site  of 
the  pillar  of  Abundance  to  that  other,  eastern, 
crossing  where  the  road  from  Fiesole  intersects  the 
east  and  west  line.  The  alterations  carried  out 
twenty  years  ago  in  the  Centre  have  made  of  the 
first  conipituvi  a  mere  street  corner  such  as  you 
may  see  anywhere  ;  while  the  other  is  still  worth 
a  visit  for  its  obvious  antiquity,  quite  apart  from 
the  interest  that  longer  and  closer  study  may  dis- 
cover here.  The  way  thither  leads  eastward,  and 
entering  the  Corso  where  once  stood  the  ancient 
Church  of  Santa  Maria  Nipotecosa — with  its  far 
memories  of  the  Matriarchate — you  find  what  the 
Centre  has  lost,  the  Florence  of  the  past.  The 
street  runs  narrow  and  straight  between  high  houses 
shaded  by  broad  eaves.  Passing  the  intersection 
of  the  Via  del  Proconsolo,  it  becomes  the  l^orgo 
degli  Albizzi,  once  called  the  Borgo  San  Piero,  and 
takes  a  still  deeper  tint  of  the  past  and  of  departed 
splendours  in  the  shadow  of  its  great  palaces,  long 


The  Ville  and  their  ReHgion  1 1  5 

the  homes  of  the  Albizzi,  the  Alessandri,  and  the 
Altoviti.  A  few  more  steps  and  you  stand  in  a 
wider  space,  the  Piazza  of  the  Mercatino  di  San 
Piero.  On  the  left  a  deep  dark  archway  brings 
hither  the  ancient  road  from  Fiesole  by  the  Borgo 
Pint!.  On  the  right  the  same  road  leaves  the  Piazza 
for  the  river  under  the  shadow  of  an  old  tower  at 
the  corner  of  the  Via  del  Mercatino.  In  front,  as 
it  were  to  mark  and  hallow  the  crossing,  stands 
a  great  portico,  the  atrium  built  in  1628  for  the 
Church  of  San  Piero  Maggiore,  and  now  the  only 
relic  of  that  very  ancient  building  which  time  has 
spared.  The  Piazza  is  a  busy  place,  with  its  shops 
and  smoking  stalls  that  offer  hot  dainties  to  the 
crowd  ;  its  traffic  of  loaded  carts,  bright  with  the 
trappings  of  their  teams,  that  still  find  this  a  con- 
venient road  to  the  hills  and  the  north.  By  day 
the  place  is  loud  with  market  cries,  and  when  night 
falls  you  may  find  the  cantastoric  chalking  the  orb 
of  the  world  on  these  stones  and  gathering  a  silent 
crowd  about  that  circle,  spellbound  to  hear  him  as 
he  recites  from  the  page  of  Serdonati  the  battle  of 
Gavinana  and  the  fall  of  Ferruccio.  But  the  deepest 
interest  of  the  place  lies  further  back  than  these 
fitfully  remembered  wars.  We  are  still  on  the 
boundary  road,  in  search  of  its  early  religious 
sanctions,  and  may  expect  to  find  these  localised 
in  no  common  way  at  this  second  conipitn})i. 

To   begin   with  what   is  certain,  this   church   had 


ii6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

extraordinary  importance  in  the  Florentine  religion 
of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  ritual  of  the  See  pre- 
served in  the  Bullettone — a  manuscript  of  the  early 
fourteenth  century — prescribed  that  each  new  bishop 
should  take  possession  here.  San  Piero  Maggiore 
thus  took  precedence  of  Santa  Reparata,  or  even 
San  Giovanni,  and  was,  if  we  accept  the  implied 
evidence  of  this  ritual,  the  religious  centre  of  the 
city. 

Nor  only  under  Christianity,  for  there  is  some 
reason  to  think  that  a  like  importance  attached 
to  this  conipitiini  in  still  earlier  times.  In  the 
neighbourhood — one  does  not  know  exactly  where 
— lay  a  street  called  the  Via  Gentilis,  which  we 
may  provisionally  translate  '  the  street  of  the 
pagans.'^  Thus  rendered,  the  name  would  probably 
belong  to  the  days  when  Christianity  was  new, 
before  it  had  quite  won  its  victory  over  heathenism, 
and  if  so,  it  surely  points  to  this  quarter  of  Florence 
as  the  place  where  the  older  religion  gathered  its 
last  forces  in  the  great  conflict.  Thus  each  bishop's 
progress  hither  assumes  the  character  of  a  demon- 
stration, ordered  in  memory  of  the  final  victory, 
and  brings  indirect  evidence  of  the  earlier  sanctity 
which  had  first  attached  to  the  cross-roads  here. 

This  established  in  a  certain  probability,  it  may 
be  possible  to  go  further,  and  even  to  ascertain  the 
manner  of  worship   practised    here    in    pagan   days. 

'   .See  below,  p.  41 1. 


The  Ville  and  their  Rehgion  1 17 

The  ritual  of  the  bishop's  entry  prescribes^  that, 
after  enthronement  in  this  church,  he  should  walk 
barefoot  westwards  along  the  Borgo,  and  pause  in 
his  progress  to  the  cathedral  to  say  certain  prayers 
at  a  place  called  the  Ge7ticiihii)i.  The  place  is  still 
marked  by  a  stone  and  inscription  under  a  window 
of  the  Palazzo  Altoviti  in  the  Borgo,  and  the  reason 
of  the  ritual  pause  and  prayer  is  given  in  the  legend 
which  tells  how,  in  the  fifth  century,  San  Zanobi 
knelt  here  to  obtain  from  God  the  life  of  a  dead 
child.  But  if  the  Geniculum  is  as  old  as  the  fifth 
century,  it  falls  within  the  limit  of  expiring  heathen- 
dom at  Florence,  and  to  the  older  religion  we  must 
turn  if  we  are  to  find  the  secret  of  the  place  and 
its  story. 

At  Rome,  too,  there  is  a  '  Genuculum,'  high  on 
the  right  bank  of  the  Tiber,  of  which  legend  tells 
that  St.  Peter  knelt  there  to  pray  before  he  was 
crucified.  Now,  obviously,  this  is  only  the  Janiculum 
of  the  pagans  in  a  new  spelling  which  suggests  the 
Latin  word  for  the  knee.  Hence,  when  this  corrup- 
tion was  no  longer  known  as  such,  an  explanatory 
legend  which  brings  the  kneeling  Apostle  on  the 
scene.  So  then  at  Florence  the  story  of  San  Za- 
nobi's  prayer  has  doubtless  arisen  in  the  same  way, 
as    the    explanation    of    a    late    misunderstanding. 

'  In  1301  this  ceremony  is  said  to  have  l)een  practised  'per  tantum 
tempus  cuius  memoria  hominum  nonerat.'  See  Bullettone,  MS.  in 
Arch.  Arcivescovile,  Florence. 


ii8  Florence  Past  and  Present 

The  Geniculum  of  the  Borgo  Sail  Piero  is  indeed 
as  old  as  the  fifth  century  ;  nay,  much  older,  for  it 
is  the  Janiculum — the  lesser  Janus  shrine — of  the 
Tuscan  city. 

If  this  was  the  lesser,  where  was  the  greater 
Janus  of  Florence?  If  we  suppose  it  stood  by 
the  Mercatino  a  double  reason  at  once  appears  in 
support  of  the  conjecture  :  Janus  shrines  were  com- 
monly set  in  or  near  market-places,  and  San  Pietro, 
who  came,  as  we  know,  to  occupy  the  ground  here, 
is  so  natural  a  substitute  that  his  presence  at  this 
compitinn,  as  on  the  Roman  Janiculum,  may  almost 
be  taken  as  itself  a  sign  of  the  preceding  pagan 
worship  that  distinguished  the  place. ^  Before  St. 
Peter  was  thought  of  as  the  Porter,  the  Door  had 
long  been  under  the  custody  of  Janus,  who  seems 
in  popular  fancy  to  have  preceded  the  Apostle  in 
this  function.  Nothing  so  easy  then,  or  so  likely, 
as  the  transition  we  have  supposed. 

Janus  is  one  of  the  oldest  names  in  Italian  myth- 
ology, and  though  his  attributes  are  obscure  at 
times,  there  is  much  regarding  him  which  seems  to 
fit  well  the  place  and  purpose  of  such  a  consecra- 
tion. He  wears  a  double  face,  which  a  distinguished 
Florentine  has  already  indicated  as  the  probable 
sign  of  a  double  government  and  state."     Here,  on 

'  Note  that  a  column  once  stood  here  no  less  tlian  al  llie  other, 
western,  cotnpituin.     Sec  Laslri,  Oss.  Fior.,  v.  p.  89. 

^  Filippo  Bonarola,  Ad  Moii.  Etriisc.  opcri  Dciupiteiiaiio  Addita 
explic.  et  conjee t.  (1724),  11.  21. 


The  Ville  and  their  Religion  1 19 

the  border-line  between  the  men  of  the  two  Ville 
Arnina  and  Camarte,  concerned  to  keep  their 
bounds  without  offering  or  suffering  intrusion,  no 
symbol  would  seem  more  significant  of  the  situation  ; 
no  god  they  knew  more  in  place  at  these  cross- 
roads. Again,  Janus  is  not  only  the  god  of  number 
and  division — witness  the  statue  of  him  set  up  in 
Rome  by  Numa  Pompilius  which  declared  in  the 
language  of  the  dumb  how  many  days  there  are  in 
the  year  ^ — but,  in  a  deeper  sense,  as  this  example 
shows,  he  represents  the  sun,  on  whose  course  and 
apparent  motion  such  division  ultimately  depends, 
and  by  which  the  year  is  measured  and  divided.- 
But  the  sun  we  know  to  have  been  the  compass  used 
by  the  Florentines  to  trace  the  east  and  west  line  of 
the  road  we  are  studying,  and  if  religion  entered 
into  the  matter  at  all — as  how  should  it  not? — the 
heavenly  sanction  they  invoked  was  no  other  than 
that  which  Janus  came  to  represent. 

Returning  now,  westward,  along  the  boundary 
road  in  the  footsteps  of  the  bishop  on  his  way  from 
San  Piero  to  the  Geniculum,  we  pause  at  the  lesser 
Janus  to  note  a  curious  correspondence  which  con- 
firms the  view  we  have  taken  of  this  road  and  its 
real  meaning.     The  Geniculum  was  not  only  visited 

'   Pliny,  Ahjtic)-al  History,  xxxiv.  7. 

-  The  Etruscan  name  of  Janus,  '  Ani,'  gives  the  Latin  word  for  the 
year,  annus,  with  a  feminine  anna  as  in  Anna  Perenna  ;  perhaps  the 
name  of  the  corresponding  goddess.  Anna  would  thus  be  the  equi- 
valent of  Diana. 


I  20  Florence  Past  and  Present 

when  a  new  bishop  came  to  the  See,  but  yearly,  and 
in  a  singular  fashion.  On  the  day  after  the  great 
feast  of  Easter  the  clergy  went  in  procession  to  San 
Piero  Maggiore :  thus  made  the  first  of  these  urban 
stations  in  sign  of  its  religious  importance.  Return- 
ing thence  by  the  Borgo,  they  halted  at  the 
Geniculum  to  sing  and  pray  in  honour  of  San 
Zanobi,  and,  this  done,  broke  up  their  assembly, 
reaching  the  cathedral  in  a  studied  haste  and  dis- 
order so  that  this  was  known  as  '  the  runaway  pro- 
cession.'^  Now  the  ritual  flight  belonged  to  many 
parts  of  pagan  practice,  and  was  generally  associated 
with  a  sacrifice  rather  apparent  than  real,  either 
because  the  human  victim  was  not,  in  fact,  killed, 
or  because  an  animal  became  his  substitute.-  The 
flight  was  part  of  the  pretence  that  a  heinous  act  of 
murder  had  been  committed  at  the  altar.  At  Rome 
such  a  flight,  known  as  the  Regifugium,  took  place 
once  a  year,  and  it  followed  immediately  on  the 
feast  of  the  Terminalia,  when  the  boundaries  of  land 
were  consecrated  anew.  Tiius  it  becomes  probable 
that  the  Easter  Monday  ceremony  at  Florence  has 
preserved  some  trace  of  an  antecedent  pagan 
observance  :  a  ritual  flight,  connected  with  a  sacrifice 
to  the  god  of  boundaries.  Nay,  it  might  be  a  ques- 
tion whether  processions  in  general,  as  a  part  of 
religious  ritual,  have  not  come  of  the  desire  to  use 

'  Dcgli  scappati.     .See  Cocchi,  Chiese  di  Firenze  (1903),  p.  97. 
"  Fowler,  Roman  Festivals,  pp.  324-330. 


The  Ville  and  their  ReHgion  121 

religion  in  the  interests  of  property ;  whether,  in 
short,  they  are  not  all  derivatives,  nearer  or  more 
remote,  of  an  original  beating  of  the  bounds.  The 
various  senses  of  the  English  word  March  are  not 
without  meaning  in  this  connection. 

Passing  westward  still  from  the  Geniculum,  one 
reaches,  in  the  Via  degli  Speziali,  a  point  where  the 
east  and  west  road  runs  not  far  from  the  site  of  the 
old  Church  of  San  Tommaso,  now  destroyed.  Built 
into  the  church  wall  there  stood  a  stone  much  older 
than  Christianity,  which  may  still  be  seen  in  the 
Archaeological  Museum.  It  is  a  cippus,  sculptured 
on  all  four  sides  with  figures  of  rampant  lions,  and 
of  a  god  which  has  been  identified  as  Usil-Aplu,  the 
deity  of  the  sun.^  The  art  is  that  of  Asia  Minor  ;  it 
speaks  of  a  time  when  as  yet  the  power  of  Rome 
was  unfelt  at  Florence,  and  the  name  of  the  Jani- 
culum  probably  unknown.  The  stone,  one  fancies, 
must  have  been  brought  to  San  Tommaso  from  some 
neighbouring  point  on  the  ritual  road,  the  Via  Sacra 
of  Florence,  since  this  was  drawn  by  the  card  of  the 
sun  and  found  its  religious  sanction  as  a  boundary 
in  the  primitive  sun-worship  practised  here.  If  we 
suppose    the    point    in   question   to    have    been    the 

^  I  do  not  know  on  what  authority  this  name  has  been  given,  but 
'  Apollo  '  in  sucli  a  situation  implies  no  idea  other  than  those  presented 
by  the  'Janus'  we  have  already  met.  The  Greeks  had  an  Apollo 
surnamed  Ovpaio's,  '  of  the  door,'  and  dyvLeu^,  as  god  of  the  city 
street,  who  is  identified  with  Janus.  See  Macrobius,  Saturuali- 
orum,  i.  9. 


122  Florence  Past  and  Present 

conipitimi  formed  where  the  road  from  Sesto  crossed 
the  Via  Sacra — which  is,  in  fact,  as  near  the  site  of 
San  Tommaso  as  may  be  on  this  line — then  a 
singular  combination  must  be  taken  account  of, 
that  in  which  the  mother  goddess  and  the  sun 
god  are  associated  on  the  same  site.  The  pillar  of 
stone  at  this  conipitimi  probably  replaced  a  tree, 
as  we  know  that  by  the  Baptistery  did.  If  we  im- 
agine the  stone  of  San  Tommaso  set  up  here  under 
the  shadow  of  the  tree  —  the  tree  representing 
the  mother  goddess  and  the  stone  the  sun  god  ^ — 
then  we  have,  in  these  twin  symbols,  the  primitive 
stock  and  stone  of  Florence  ;  the  visible  signs 
of  the  sanctity  early  religion  lent  to  this  boundary 
line. 

One  matter  remains  for  consideration,  the  relation 
of  the  goddess  to  the  god.  Whether  their  material 
symbols  ever  stood  together  at  the  western  cross- 
roads or  not,  it  is  certain  that  the  goddess  and  the 
god  shared  the  honours  of  this  ritual  road.  Whether 
the  stone  of  the  sun  ever  stood  under  the  tree  here 
or  not,  to  suppose  it  did  so  is  to  have  a  striking 
symbol  of  how  the  goddess  related  herself  to  the  god 
in  the  minds  of  their  worshippers.  These  are  men 
of  the  Matriarchate,  and  the  Matriarchate  means 
that  under  it  the  man  looks  up  to  the  woman  as  the 

'  So  sometimes  in  Syria.  Kut  the  symbols  were  often  reversed  : 
the  tree  lepresenling  the  male,  and  the  pointed  stone  the  female, 
element.  See  authorities  cited  hy  Krazer  in  his  Adonis  (1907),  p.  14, 
note  6. 


The  Ville  and  their  Religion  123 

original  and  head  of  his  race,  as  the  Adimari,  hard 
by  this  crossing,  looked  to  Cosa,  their  eponymous 
foundress.  And  still  at  Florence  the  race  is  called 
the  ceppo,  the  tree-trunk,  from  which  the  branches 
break  out,  and  the  twigs  still  divide.  Under  the 
Matriarchate,  then,  the  tree  is  the  mother,  where 
every  branch  and  tv/ig  belongs  to  the  whole  only  in 
right  of  each  fresh  female  descent.  The  woman 
is  the  original,  and  the  male  the  derivative,  in  such 
a  genealogy. 

As  with  the  men  so  with  the  gods  they  create  and 
worship.  The  pillar  stood  for  the  tree  ;  the  tree  was 
the  ceppo,  the  stock,  the  original  mother  deity,  under 
whose  shadow  the  god  represented  the  male 
principle ;  necessary  indeed  to  the  generation  of 
men  ;  appearing,  therefore,  beside  the  mother  god- 
dess, yet  certainly  derivative  and  subordinate  even 
in  such  a  situation.  He  might  be,  and  here  he  cer- 
tainly was,  the  sun  itself,  strong  as  a  lion  to  run  the 
daily  race  of  heaven.  But  if  so,  the  goddess  still 
rose  above  and  behind  him  as  the  stock  surpassed 
the  stone,  for  she  was  the  light  itself,  the  dawn  seen 
before  the  sun  appears,  the  twilight  glow  when  he  is 
gone,  the  bright  constant  background  to  all  his  daily 
splendour.  /\s  the  pearl  that  grows  on  the  shell  is 
but  a  gathering  in  one  small  orb  of  the  wider 
brightness  behind  that  we  still  call  the  niotJicr-oi- 
pearl,  so  it  seemed  to  the  old  world  that  the  sun 
itself  was  derived,  not  original  ;  a  gathered  splendour 


124  Florence  Past  and  Present 

made  of  the  mother  light  of  heaven  through  which 
he  moved. ^ 

There  is  another  view  of  this  relation  so  natural 
as  to  be  inevitable.  Once  admit  the  idea  of  sex  in 
such  a  theology,  and  sooner  or  later  it  will  issue  in 
the  doctrine  of  a  divine  marriage  between  the  god- 
dess and  the  god:  a  relation  infinitely  important  to 
man  because  conceived  of  as  the  fruitful  source  of 
every  blessing  he  enjoys,  including  and  transcending 
life  itself  Now  it  is  singular  that  while  death  lies  at 
the  western  end  of  the  Via  Sacra  in  the  cemetery 
set  towards  the  sunset,  life  in  its  source  is  acted  at 
the  other  towards  the  sunrising.  We  only  know  this 
latter  rite  in  the  form  in  which  Christianity  has 
admitted  and  preserved  it :  the  ritual  marriage  of 
the  bishop  to  the  abbess  of  San  Piero."  But  the 
rite  has  so  little  of  Christianity  about  it,  and  agrees 
so  well  with  the  known  pagan  practice  of  the  'Iepo<? 
Pa/io?  that  under  the  robes  of  Christian  Rome  we 
can  easily  discern  those  of  a  long  series  of  priests 
and  priestesses,  the  representatives  in  this  rite  of  the 
goddess  and  the  god  respectively.  If  the  idea  of 
property  in  land  came  with  the  first  practice  of 
agriculture  here  ;  if  the  Via  Sacra  was  the  boundary 
drawn  to  divide  tilth  from  tilth  ;  early  beliefs  not  yet 

^  Even  the  Australian  aborigines  call  llie  planet  \'eniis  the  '  Mother 
of  the  Sun.'  See  F.  T.  Elworthy,  The  Evil  Eye  (London  :  Murray, 
1895),  p.  439,  who  quotes  J.  Dawson,  Australian  Aborigines  (Mel- 
bourne, 1881),  pp.  49,  100. 

-  See  below,  p.  413,  for  a  full  discussion  of  this  ceremony. 


The  Ville  and  their  ReHgion  125 

extinct  in  some  parts  of  the  world  assure  us  that 
this  ritual  marriage  arose  naturally  in  such  a  situa- 
tion as  the  act  of  sympathetic  magic  relied  on  to 
secure  the  fruitfulness  of  these  adjoining  fields. 

So,  then,  it  may  well  have  been,  but  a  yet  higher 
certainty  is  within  reach  if  we  turn  from  all  that  is 
doubtful  in  these  details  to  the  general  ideas  the 
road  represented  and  the  roots  of  religion  that  first 
sanctified  it.  The  Via  Sacra  runs  from  stream  to 
stream  guided  by  the  sun.  Fire  and  water,  or  if 
you  please,  heaven  and  earth,  are  what  the  men  of 
Arnina  and  Camarte  call  to  witness  by  their  border. 
So  long,  they  say,  as  Mugnone  and  Affrico  flow,  so 
long  as  the  sun  rises,  souths  and  sets,  shall  our 
bargain  last,  and  our  border  be  sure.  By  our  dead 
we  swear  it. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  FLORENCE 

It  is  probable  that  the  east  and  west  road  from  the 
Affrico  to  the  Mugnone  was  originally  a  boundary  ; 
its  undoubted  religious  importance  as,  so  to  say,  the 
Via  Sacra  of  Florence,  is  best  explained  on  such  a 
supposition.  But  this  was  not  its  only  character  and 
use.  Amid  much  that  must  be  always  matter  of 
inference  and  conjecture  only,  one  fact  emerges  both 
sure  and  significant :  this  road,  as  it  runs  from  east 
to  west,  is  the  directive  line  along  which  the  develop- 
ment of  the  city  has  proceeded.  Where  it  cuts  the 
vital  lines  of  the  roads  that  come  to  the  Arno  ferry 
from  Sesto  and  Borgunto  respectively,  it  forms  the 
two  co^inpita  of  which  the  last  chapter  has  taken 
account.  These  we  must  now  look  at  from  another 
point  of  view.  They  are  markets — the  Mercatino 
and  the  Mercato — and  draw  population  about  them 
in  varying  degrees  from  age  to  age.  The  cause  of 
that  variety  and,  in  particular,  of  the  westward 
movement  of  Florence,  which  in  the  end  gave  the 
Mercato    its     advantage    over    the     Mercatino,    and 

120 


The  Development  of  Florence  127 

established  it  as  the  ultimate  centre,  is  worth  investi- 
gation, and  our  study  of  it  must  begin  in  the 
simplicity  of  the  thing  itself;  the  force  that  obliged 
development  and  progress  here.  That  force,  though 
a  real  benefit,  appeared  in  unfriendly  shape,  and  was 
felt  with  the  coming  of  the  Etruscan  invader  and 
conqueror. 

As  far  as  one  can  see  in  the  dim  light  that  falls  on 
this  people  from  early  times,  the  Etruscans  were  a 
race  of  pirates  settled  in  the  northern  islands  of  the 
/Egean  sea — Lemnos  and  the  others — and  in  part 
on  the  coasts  of  Greece — at  Mount  Athos — and  of 
Asia,  in  Caria  and  Lycia.  If,  as  seems  likely,  they 
are  the  '  Turscha  '  of  the  Egyptian  monuments,  who 
had  a  colony  by  the  Nile,  then  one  must  suppose 
that  they  were  essentially  traders,  who,  because 
their  seat  was  by  the  sea,  and  their  lawful  opportuni- 
ties insufficient,  eked  out  their  living  by  piracy  as 
occasion  served.  This  combination  of  sea  trade  and 
robbery  is  one  that  the  Mediterranean  has  often 
seen,  nor  is  it  yet  completely  suppressed  among  the 
Greek  islands  where  the  Etruscans  had  their  early 
seat.^ 

^  '  There  was  no  hard  and  fast  line  between  the  marine:  and  the 
pirate.  In  the  Mediterranean,  piracy  .  .  .  was  the  resource  of  the 
young,  active,  and  resolute  among  the  seafaring  population.  The 
merchant  service  was  manned,  to  a  great  extent,  by  pirates  who  were 
getting  too  old  for  that  honourable  calling.'— W.  Ashburner,  The 
Rhodian  Sea  Law  (Oxford,  1909),  p.  cclxii.  This  for  the  Middle 
Ages,  while  for  modern  times — 1898-1900 — see  J.  C.  Lawson,  Modern 
Greek  /•ij/^'-Zorc  (Cambridge,  1910),  p.   162. 


128  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Possessed,  then,  of  ships,  accustomed  to  the  sea, 
strong  and  unscrupulous,  the  Etruscans  came  west 
and  northward,  landed  on  the  Mediterranean  coast 
of   Italy,    and    conquered    the    country    they    had 
reached.      It  is,  above  all,  important  to  notice,  how- 
ever, that  these  conquerors  were  men  of  war  here, 
just  as  they  had  been  pirates  in  the  ^gean,  by  the 
mere  force  of  circumstances  and  as  a  means  to  an 
end.     Essentially  they   were  traders,   and   here  this 
invasion    shows    a    marked    difference    from    many 
others   under  which    Italy    has    from    time    to   time 
suffered.     The  people  who  held  Tuscany  were  now 
subdued  by  invaders  whose  habit  and  purpose  in  life 
was   closely  of  kin   to   their  own  ;    conquerors   who 
understood  the  country, and  found  it  worth  taking  and 
keeping  because  its  nature  gave  them  just  the  seat 
and  wide  commercial  opportunity  of  which  they  were 
in  search.     That  the  Etruscans  were  as  we  have  sup- 
posed them  appears  plainly  in  the  fact  that,  though 
in  time  they  overran   Italy,  and  have  left  traces  of 
their    occupation   in    Lombardy,  in   Latium,  and  in 
Campania,    when    their    power    sank     it    was    upon 
Etruria  they  retreated,  and  that  Tuscany  alone  of  all 
the   Italian    provinces    still    bears  their  name.     For 
Tuscany,  as  by  its  ver\'  nature  a  link-land,  is  made 
for  commerce,  and  those  who  choose  and  hold  it  as 
their  chief  seat  may  come   as   conquerors,  but  can 
only    remain    here    as     masters    of    trade    and     of 
exchamie. 


The  Development  of  Florence  129 

Etruscan  Fiesole  is  in  itself  an  object-lesson  of 
this  invasion  and  its  consequences.  The  city  set 
on  the  hill,  with  its  great  walls  of  massive  stone,  is 
nothing  if  not  a  fortress,  built  here  to  occupy  and 
overawe  the  country.  But  if  the  place  speaks  of 
war  and  of  armed  occupation,  its  situation  should 
be  enough  to  reveal  something  deeper  and  more 
permanent ;  the  underlying  purpose  of  the  invader. 
Two  trade  routes  pass  here,  one  rising  from  Candeli 
to  the  high  saddle  of  the  hill  where  Borgunto  is 
set,  and  running  thence  to  the  Olmo ;  the  other 
reaching  the  same  point  from  the  Arno  by  the 
gorge  and  valley  of  the  Mugnone.  Between  these 
stands  Fiesole,  so  placed  that  the  higher  route  runs 
under  its  eastern  wall,  and  Borgunto  becomes  as  it 
were  a  suburb  of  the  new  city,  which,  on  the  west, 
looks  down  on  the  lower  road  where  it  threads  the 
narrow  pass  between  Monte  Rinaldi  and  the  hill 
that  the  Etruscans  had  chosen  and  crowned.  Fiesole 
occupies  a  strategic  position  then,  but  the  strategy 
expressed  in  this  station  is  that  which  pretends 
to  the  control  of  all  commerce  that  passes  north 
from  the  ferry  of  the  Arno  where  Florence  is  set, 
or  from  Arezzo  by  way  of  Candeli.  The  attitude 
of  the  invaders  is  thus  clearly  defined  :  they  come 
not  to  destroy  but  to  control,  to  develop,  and  to 
extend  the  trade  they  find  on  foot  here.  Traders 
themselves  essentially,  their  arms  and  power  are 
directed  by  a  feeling  for  commerce  and  a  knowledge 

I 


130  Florence  Past  and  Present 

of  it.  They  will  use  force  only  to  find  their  own 
place  in  the  sun,  and  to  turn  existing  Tuscan  trade 
to  their  own  advantage. 

The  details  of  the  Etruscan  commercial  policy 
lie  beyond  our  reach  and  may  be  for  ever  irrecover- 
able ;  what  seems  certain  is  that,  in  one  form  or 
other,  the  conquerors  took  toll  of  the  country  they 
held,  as  those  in  commerce  always  do  in  every 
exchange  where  they  have  a  hand.  If  they  were 
themselves  traders  with  an  inborn  commercial 
capacity  and  inherited  experience,  this  might  be 
expected  to  show  itself  in  their  moderation  and 
co-operation  ;  they  would  not  pretend  to  a  profit  that 
might  crush  the  trade  they  controlled,  and  would 
rather  increase  their  gains  by  bringing  all  their 
resources  to  bear  upon  its  development  and  ex- 
tension. The  known  prosperity  of  Tuscany  under 
their  rule  seems  to  show  that  such  was,  in  fact,  the 
policy  of  the  Etruscans  in  the  country  they  had 
made  their  own. 

It  may  be  worth  while  to  examine  in  some  detail 
the  development  of  Tuscan  trade  under  its  new 
masters.  These  were  the  last  arrivals  from  the 
East,  and  they  put  Tuscan}',  therefore,  in  a  new 
and  closer  relation  with  the  great  eastern  markets, 
and  with  the  movcnients  of  overseas  trade.  The 
ships  that  had  brought  their  warlike  expedition 
remained  to  come  and  go  on  peaceful  rather  than 
piratical    errands.       Possessed    of    their    new    and 


The  Development  of  Florence  131 

commanding  commercial  seat,  the  Etruscans  made 
common  cause  with  Phocaea,  Phoenicia  and  Carth- 
age in  a  Mediterranean  trade  that  touched  Crete 
and  Cyprus  and  many  a  coast  beside.  The  /Egaean 
brooch^  shows  that  Plorence  was  in  touch  with 
the  East  long  before  the  Etruscans  came,  and  the 
tusks  of  Cappiano  probably  tell  the  same  story,  but 
with  the  coming  of  these  conquerors  the  old  trade 
surely  found  new  doors  and  a  wider  development. 
The  ruling  race  were  a  luxurious  people,  and  their 
Tuscan  subjects  and  carriers  had  more  to  do  than 
ever  as  the  incense,  the  ivory,  the  perfumed  oils, 
and  painted  pottery  of  the  south  and  east  reached 
the  coast  and  came  under  their  handling  for  cross- 
country transport. 

There  was  more  than  mere  mercantile  advantage 
in  these  imports  ;  they  could  not  but  stimulate 
existing  manufactures  and  inspire  local  art  in  its 
first  manifestations.  Pottery  came  west,  not  only 
to  be  handled  by  Tuscan  carriers,  but  copied  on 
Tuscan  wheels,  till  the  vases  of  Arezzo  came  at 
last  to  vie  with  the  best  that  the  sea  could  bring.- 
Modelling  in  clay  became  sculpture  in  stone,  and  the 
series  of  «}>/•/ wrought  here  under  the  Etruscan  rule 
show  plainly  that  this  art  drew  its  inspiration  from 
the  East,  and  was  a  consequence  of  the  bonds  that 
expanding  commerce  had  drawn  still  closer  between 
Tuscany  and  the  lands  of  the  rising  sun.     The  lions 

'  See  above,  p.  72.  '  In  late  Roman  times,  however. 


I  'X2 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


of  Usil  ^  recall  those  found  at  many  an  ancient  site 
in  Asia  Minor,  and  the  finials  of  the  other  cippi 
repeat  a  7notif  covaxnon  to  Minoan  art  and  to  that 
of  Mycenae  alike.  To  study  the  series  of  these 
stones  in  the  Museum  of  Florence  is  to  see  the  new 
outlook  of  that  city  on  the  east,  and  the  new  im- 
pulse she  received  from  her  growing  trade. 

These  imports  were  necessarily  paid  for,  and  at 
a  price  which  rose  with  their  rarity,  and  the  distance 
which  separated  Tuscany  from  the  countries  that 
produced  them.  Now  imports  can  only  be  paid 
for  in  one  way,  by  exports  of  corresponding  moment 
and  value.  Hence  the  growth  of  Tuscan  commerce 
necessarily  implies  the  development  of  local  re- 
sources in  Tuscany,  and  the  Etruscan  rule,  under 
which  such  development  took  place,  distinguished 
itself  eminently  here  :  in  the  application  of  new  art 
and  energy  to  the  improvement  of  the  country  so 
as  to  secure  a  new  productiveness  answerable  to 
the  demands  of  the  wider  market. 

No  small  part  of  the  riches  of  Tuscany  lay  under- 
cfround  in  the  mineral  wealth  of  the  Maremma,  her 
maritime  province,  and  copper,  abundant  in  these 
hills,  had  a  place  and  a  price  in  early  markets 
which  made  it  a  standard  of  value.  The  cm's  rude, 
the  earliest  Italian  currency,  was  of  copper,  and 
passed  from  hand  to  hand  in  the  form  of  rough 
ingots  unmarked  at  first  by  any  device ;  carrying 
J  See  above,  p.  121. 


The  Development  of  Florence  i 


Ov3 


their  own  guarantee  in  the  weight  of  metal  they 
offered  to  the  balance.  Analysis  of  metal  instru- 
ments, implements  of  the  Bronze  Age  found  in 
Italian  tombs,  seems  to  show  that  the  copper  used 
to  form  them  was  found  locally  and  came  from  the 
mines  of  the  Tuscan  Maremma.^  Mining,  then,  was 
practised  here  in  all  probability  before  the  Etruscans 
came,  but  gained  a  new  importance  and  was  pursued 
with  new  energy  under  their  rule.  If,  as  seems 
likely,  they  made  their  first  settlements  at  Caere, 
Vulci,  and  Vetulonia,  and  moved  gradually  up 
country  from  thence,  then  from  the  beginning  of 
their  enterprise  they  were  acquainted  with  these 
riches  of  the  sea-board,  and,  as  shrewd  merchants, 
did  not  forget  their  value.  Here  at  hand  was  the 
means  of  paying  imports  in  the  export  of  the  then 
precious  metal,  and  thus  of  competing  in  far  Phoeni- 
cian markets  with  Cyprus  itself,  hitherto  the  chief 
source  of  supply  ;  for  this  island,  as  its  very  name 
indicates,  had  long  furnished  copper  to  the  coasts 
of  the  Mediterranean.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  we  know 
that  copper  in  the  form  of  bronze  was  one  of  the 
chief  exports  in  the  I'^truscan  trade,  and  the  precious 
art  that  still  shines  in  the  bronzes  of  many  a  Tuscan 
museum  shows  how  far  trade  and  manufacture 
stimulated  each  other.  Under  the  Etruscan  rule 
commerce  and  art  rose  hand  in  hand,  just  as  they 

^  See  A.  Mosso,  On'gini  dclla  Civilta  J/(?(rV/'c-;7-a;;trt  (Milano  :  Treves, 
I910),  pp.  301-7. 


134  Florence  Past  and  Present 

did  two  thousand  years  later  in  the  days  of  the 
Florentine  Renaissance.  For  at  Florence  the  highest 
developments  of  the  human  spirit  are  fatally,  inevit- 
ably, bound  up  with  commercial  enterprise  and 
success.  The  Genius  loci  here  is  Janus,  the  god  of 
the  portico  and  of  the  market. 

Another  source  of  riches  lay  above  ground  in  the 
forests  of  Tuscany,  hardly  touched  as  yet,  covering 
all  the  hills,  and  ready  to  yield  almost  inexhaustible 
supplies  of  timber.  These  tall  and  solid  trees  must 
have  appealed  at  once  to  the  Etruscans,  who  had 
reached  the  coast  in  ships  and  saw  their  value  for 
the  construction  of  sea-going  vessels.  Thenceforth 
each  trading  voyage,  accomplished  in  craft  built 
here,  became  an  advertisement  in  every  port  of  the 
quality  of  Tuscan  timber.  To  the  Etruscan  period, 
then,  may  be  attributed  the  first  serious  felling  of 
trees  in  the  Val  d'Arno,  and  the  use  of  the  river 
and  the  sea  to  carry  logs  abroad  in  rafts  as  an 
article  of  commerce.  What  Tuscan  copper  was  in 
the  overseas  market  Tuscan  timber  became  in  the 
nearer  Italian  ports,  and  Florence,  set  by  the  stream, 
could  not  remain  unaffected  by  the  new  venture. 
She  was  now  a  principal  gate  through  which  the 
neighbouring  woods  sent  their  trees  downstream  to 
Pisa  and  the  sea.  The  Piazza  d'Arno,  her  original 
seat  and  centre,  has  an  alternative  name — the  Piazza 
delle  Travi — derived  from  this  traffic.  As  the  name 
indicates,  the  timber  trade  lasted  down  to  our  own 


The  Development  of  Florence  135 

day,  with  this  Piazza  as  one  of  its  principal  seats. 
There  is  much  evidence  to  show  that  it  was  busy 
in  Roman  times,  but  we  may  safely  hold  that  the 
Etruscans  were  the  first  to  develop  the  timber  trade 
in  serious  sort,  as  a  ready  and  natural  means  of 
paying  for  the  imports  that  their  high  civilisation 
demanded. 

The  trade  in  wood  implied,  of  course,  the  clearing 
of  the  land,  with,  as  its  consequence,  a  new  and 
wider  agriculture.  It  is  said  that  the  Etruscans 
used  the  labour  of  slaves  in  this  larger  and  intenser 
cultivation.  It  may  be  so  ;  what  seems  certain  is 
the  passion  with  which  they  promoted  this  further 
conquest  of  the  earth.  We  have  already  noticed 
how  naturally  religion  is  stimulated  and  developed 
by  the  sense  of  property  in  arable  land,  and  may 
here  remember  as  not  without  significance  how  the 
Etruscan  legend  made  Tages,  the  mysterious  author 
of  their  supernatural  discipline,  rise  from  the  fields 
of  Tarquinii.  A  contadiito  following  the  plough 
was  the  first  witness  of  the  birth  in  which  his 
furrow  brought  forth  the  god,  under  the  appearance 
of  a  child,  but  venerable  with  all  the  wisdom  of  the 
ages.  By  their  own  confession  the  Etruscans  learned 
this  mystery  after  they  reached  Italy  ;  it  was  the 
Genius  loci  that  taught  them  what  they  came  to 
know.  If  we  suppose  that  the  tree,  which  was  the 
first  plough,  turned  up  a  strange  stone  in  the  furrow, 
we  are  probably  as  near  the  ultimate  material  fact 


o 


6  Florence  Past  and  Present 


of  this  mystery  as  may  be.  Yet  so,  we  but  find 
again  the  tree  and  the  stone,  the  goddess  and  the 
god,  in  a  new  discovery.  This  was  what  Italy 
taught  the  Etruscans;  their  developed  discipline 
depended  on  beHefs  they  found  rooted  in  the  Tuscan 
soil,  and  firmly  established  here  before  their  arrival. 
The  legend  that  what  Tages  left  unsaid  was  told 
by  the  nymph  Begoe,  expounder  of  the  lore  of 
heaven  and  of  the  lightning,  but  lays  the  emphasis 
again  where  we  have  found  it  fall  naturally  among 
people  living  under  a  Matriarchate.  Nor  need  it 
seem  strange  that  the  new-comers  were  so  teachable  ; 
fell  so  easily  under  the  spell  of  the  western  land 
they  had  made  their  own.  For  the  Etruscans  knew 
the  Matriarchate  already  in  their  eastern  seat,  and 
brought  it  with  them  when  they  came  west.  Traders 
and  pirates,  they  had  fallen  into  the  way  of  life  and 
of  society  natural  to  men  who  spend  their  time  from 
home  in  the  expeditions  of  commerce  or  of  war. 
They  were  formed  for  Tuscany  before  ever  they 
saw  it,  as  the  Tuscans  were  formed  against  the  day 
of  their  conquest.  Conquerors  and  conquered  alike 
learned  from  each  other  in  a  mutual  understanding 
which  made  of  the  first  armed  occupation  a  stable 
commonwealth  in  Tuscany. 

In  the  neighbourhood  of  Florence  the  progress  of 
agriculture  had  its  own  local  problem  to  solve.  The 
passion  of  which  we  have  spoken  could  not  but 
direct  the  eyes  of  the  new  masters  to  the  plain  that 


The  Development  of  Florence  137 

stretched  above,  but  still  more  widely  below,  the  city. 
Here  lay  the  alluvial  lands  that  the  river  had  formed 
and  the  lake  left,  deep  and  rich,  promising  large 
reward  to  the  labour  of  the  plough.  But  the  work 
and  power  of  the  waters  were  not  yet  spent ;  in  part 
the  plain  was  a  mere  marsh,  the  shallow  survival  of 
what  had  once  been  deep  water.  In  part  the  stream 
still  claimed  it,  wandering  widely  and  threatening 
anew  with  each  fresh  flood.  If  this  ground  was  to 
become  arable  and  profitable  it  must  be  drained, 
secured,  and  reclaimed. 

How,  when,  and  where  the  Etruscans  learned  their 
skill  as  civil  engineers  must  remain  uncertain,  though 
possibly  the  colony  of  the  '  Turscha '  by  the  Nile 
may  have  had  something  to  say  in  the  matter.  It  is 
certain  at  any  rate  that  this  skill  was  theirs,  and  that 
they  accomplished  important  hydraulic  works  in 
Italy.  Pliny  tells  us  that  they  were  busy  in  the 
Italian  delta,  that  of  the  Po,  bringing  new  order 
among  its  scattered  streams,  turning  the  river  into 
the  marshes  by  Adria  that  this  city  of  theirs  might 
stand  safe  and  rule  fertile  fields  where  water  had 
spread  before.^  But  surely  if  the  Tyrrhenian  coast 
was  the  point  of  departure  in  the  Etruscan  conquest, 
this  people  must  have  looked  down  on  the  marshes 
of  the  Arno  from  Fiesole  before  they  saw  those  of 
the  Po  from  Adria.  So  when  Villani  says,  'We  are 
assured,  nay   can  see  with  our  own   eyes,  that  the 

^  Natural  History,  iii.  i6. 


138  Florence  Past  and  Present 

said  stone  of  the  Golfolina  was  attacked  by  skilled 
workmen,  who  with  pick  and  chisel  laboured  its 
cutting  so  that  the  level  of  the  Arno  was  lowered, 
and  the  stream  so  sunk  that  the  said  marshes  drained 
away  and  left  fertile  soil,'  the  natural  conclusion  is 
that  his  words  register  a  tradition  of  I^truscan  times 
when  engineering  was  first  applied  to  the  service  of 
Florentine  agriculture.  If  we  further  suppose  that 
the  irregular  and  uncertain  Arno  was  embanked  and 
directed  in  these  plains — from  the  Girone  to  San 
Giorgio,  and  from  that  Florentine  ferry  to  the  Gol- 
folina— ^just  as  Pliny  says  the  Etruscans  handled 
and  constrained  the  Po  at  Adria — we  see  the  sure 
emergence  of  the  F'lorentine  anitado,  with  all  the 
possibilities  it  offered  of  a  wide  and  profitable  cul- 
ture in  the  close  neighbourhood  of  the  city.  These 
were  the  lands  that  filled  the  Piazze  of  Florence 
with  corn  and  wine  and  oil,  and  this  the  agriculture 
that  supported,  as  it  still  does,  her  weekly  market. 
Villani  must  again  be  quoted  here,  as  he  says:  '  It 
is  true  indeed  that  the  site  of  1^'lorence  held  some- 
thing of  a  village  .  .  .  for  the  men  of  h'iesole  kept 
market  here  once  a  week.  This  suburb  was  called 
by  its  old  name  Campo  Marti,  since  there  was  ever 
a  marlvct  here  even  before  Fiesole  was  founded,  and 
this  was  its  name  before  it  became  a  city  and  bore 
the  name  of  Florence.'  Both  the  pre-Ktruscan  com- 
merce here  and  its  development  under  the  new 
regiuic  are  clearly  indicated  in  this  passage,  and  very 


The  Development  of  Florence  139 

much  as  we  have  already  conceived  them  ;  nay,  there 
is  indirect  evidence  in  this  tradition  of  the  site  occu- 
pied by  the  Villa  of  Camarte.  We  have  supposed 
this  to  lie  well  to  the  north  of  the  Villa  Arnina  and 
the  ferry  ;  and,  in  fact,  it  must  have  done  so  if  it, 
rather  than  the  other,  was  chosen  as  the  seat  of  the 
market  to  which  the  men  of  Fiesole  came  so  often 
and  so  regularly. 

If  Etruscan  engineers  were  busy  on  the  Arno, 
cutting  a  deeper  course  for  the  river  at  the  Golfolina, 
and  embanking  its  wandering  streams  in  the  plain  of 
Florence,  there  is  some  reason  to  think  they  did  not 
leave  the  passage  of  the  Girone  untouched  by  their 
art.  Villani  is  again  our  authority  for  the  tradition 
that  the  first  Arno  bridge  was  built,  not  at  the 
Florentine  ferry,  but  at  Candeli.  For  if  a  bridge 
stood  here  before  the  Ponte  Vecchio  was  thought  of, 
such  precedence  implies  much.  It  speaks  of  a  time 
not  merely  remote,  but  such  that  Fiesole  and  not 
Florence  was  then  the  place  of  chief  importance. 
Hither  rose  the  road  from  Candeli ;  the  bridge  had 
its  meaning  only  as  a  convenience  for  the  traffic 
between  south  and  north  on  the  line  that  passed 
through  Borgunto.  Unless,  therefore,  we  bring  the 
tradition  down  to  times  late  indeed,  and  suppose  it 
no  older  than  the  sixth  or  seventh  century  of  our 
era  when  Fiesole  seems  again  to  have  flourished  at 
the  expense  of  Florence,  there  is  no  escape  from  the 
conclusion  that    the  bridge  in  question  must  have 


140  Florence  Past  and  Present 

been  contrived  by  the  Etruscans  in  correspondence 
with  their  seat  at  Fiesole,  and  for  the  convenience  of 
the  trade  it  was  their  chief  interest  to  promote. 

The  same  may  be  said  of  the  hydraulic  system  by 
which  Florence  was  flushed  and  periodically  cleansed 
in  the  admission  of  water  from  the  river  which 
entered  and  left  the  town  by  subterranean  channels. 
It  is  true  that  the  chronicles  ascribe  this  device  to 
the  Romans  ;  but  Fiesole  itself,  like  many  an  ancient 
Tuscan  seat,  shows  that  in  all  such  matters  of  drain- 
age, and  of  the  application  of  engineering  to  civic 
needs,  the  Etruscans  led  the  way.  Those  who  had 
cut  the  Golfolina  channel  and  bridged  that  of  Can- 
deli,  under  whose  skill  and  energy  the  contado  began 
to  emerge,  and  to  supply  the  Florentine  market,  are 
here  seen  applying  their  art  still  more  closely  for  the 
improvement  of  the  town  itself.  Arrived  thus  once 
more  at  Florence,  we  may  resume  the  story  of  her 
local  development  under  the  Etruscan  power  and  in 
the  days  that  followed  its  decline  and  fall. 

Let  it  be  repeated,  then,  that  the  Via  Sacra  formed 
the  boundary  between  the  two  settlements  of  which 
Florence  originally  consisted  :  the  Villa  Arnina  by 
the  river  ferry  at  the  I'iazza  delle  Travi,  and  the 
Villa  Camarte  towards  Fiesole.  Two  points  of  chief 
importance  lay  on  this  ritual  road,  and  these  were 
the  crossings  where  it  met  the  western  and  eastern 
branches  of  the  V  respectively.  The  history  of 
Florentine  development  in  a  material  sense  lies  at 


The  Development  of  Florence  141 

these  crossings,  and  lives  in  the  markets  which  came 
to  distinguish  them.  The  progress  of  the  place 
moves  westward,  carrying  the  Centre  from  the  one 
crossing  to  the  other.  Once  the  heart  of  Florence 
lay  at  the  Mercatino,  as  the  late  importance  of  the 
church  there  still  testified  down  to  the  end  of  the 
Middle  Ages.  But  that  diminutive  had  its  meaning; 
betimes  the  Centre  moved  west  to  the  Mercato  at 
the  western  crossing,  making  this  the  market  par 
excelle7ice,  and  in  this  transition  Florence  came  to 
find  her  Centre  where  it  lies  still,  though  late  changes 
have  swept  the  market  away.  Clearly,  then,  to 
understand  the  forces  that  lay  behind  this  westward 
movement  of  the  Centre  is  to  read  the  secret  of  the 
long  story  of  the  place  ;  so  far  at  least  as  the  history 
of  Florence  is  bound  up  in  her  material  development 
and  expressed  in  her  gradual  occupation  of  the  wide 
site  she  holds. 

When  Fiesole  was  young,  if  not  during  the  whole 
period  of  the  Etruscan  power,  the  neighbourhood  of 
the  city  on  the  hill  must  have  given  new  importance 
to  the  road  that  joined  it  to  the  Villa  Arnina  and  to 
the  river  at  the  Piazza  delle  Travi.  But  this  was 
the  road  that  formed  the  eastern  crossing  with  the 
Via  Sacra,  and  these  then  were  the  conditions  under 
which  the  market  here,  now  called  the  Mercatino, 
naturally  took  the  lead  and  won  a  pre-eminence 
which,  in  one  form  or  other,  in  a  civil  or  religious 
sense,  lasted  so  long.    Population  must  have  gathered 


142  Florence  Past  and  Present 

at  the  crossing,  not  only  to  attend  the  weekly 
market,  but  to  settle  and  build  in  its  neighbourhood 
in  the  four  irregular  quarters  which  the  roads  defined 
and  divided.  Hither  must  the  houses  have  crept 
upwards  from  the  Villa  Arnina,  and  the  attraction 
of  the  market-town  would  be  felt  at  Fiesole,  which 
probably  sent  down  some  of  its  Etruscan  population 
to  live  and  trade  at  the  cross-roads.  When  one 
remembers  how  much  the  dominant  class  had  in 
common  with  the  people  they  subdued,  and  how,  in 
fact,  one  commonwealth  came  to  comprehend  victors 
and  vanquished  in  Tuscany,  Florence,  gathering  at 
this  her  earU'  Centre,  begins  to  ajjpear  as  probably 
one  of  the  chief  points  where  a  mutual  understand- 
ing was  arrived  at  on  the  material  basis  of  a  com- 
mon interest  in  trade.  The  Genius  loci,  in  short, 
again  appears  on  his  own  ground  as  Janus — Ani  the 
Etruscans  called  him — the  power  that  lies  at  and 
behind  the  market-place,  ready  to  make  of  twain 
one  new  people,  as  his  twofold  image  sufficiently 
declares. 

The  transference  of  the  Centre  westward  from  the 
Mercatino  to  the  Mercato  implies  a  change  of  condi- 
tions in  Florence.  If  the  Mercatino  is  to  lose  its  old 
importance,  this  can  only  be  because  traffic  on  the 
north  and  south  road  here  is  no  longer  what  it  was. 
Nor  can  that  traffic  fail  as  long  as  Fiesole,  which 
had  encouraged  it,  continues  to  flourish.  The  de- 
cline of  the  Etruscan  wealth  and   power   at  this  its 


The  Development  of  Florence  143 

chief  local  seat  is,  therefore,  the  first  condition  of  the 
transference  that  moved  the  Centre  of  Florence  from 
the  eastern  to  the  western  cross-roads. 

Something  more  is  needed,  however,  to  account 
fully  for  such  a  change.  The  failing  traffic  at  the 
Mercatino  must  find  a  new  direction,  and  one  that 
leads  it  to  the  Mercato.  Under  what  power  would 
such  a  transference  take  place,  and  what  was  the 
attraction  which  finally  set  the  Centre  of  Florence 
where  it  stands  to-day? 

Hitherto  we  have  thought  of  traffic  as  conducted 
solely  by  the  help  of  beasts  of  burden  :  the  mule 
or  the  pack-horse.  But  an  innovation  is  on  the  way 
whereby  the  strength  of  these  animals  becomes  still 
more  serviceable  in  the  transport  of  merchandise. 
The  chariot,  long  known  in  war,  becomes  the  market 
cart,  and  with  that  change  the  wheel  enters  on  a 
new  period  of  usefulness  as  a  mechanical  power 
applied  to  the  needs,  and  for  the  advantage,  of 
commerce. 

This  great  moment  was  long  delayed  ;  not  because 
the  wheel  awaited  discovery — every  potter  knew  it, 
and,  as  an  ornament,  it  is  found  in  Italian  deposits 
of  the  Bronze  Age — but  because,  as  an  aid  to  traffic, 
the  wheel  is  useless  without  the  road  ;  nay,  without 
roads  that  have  been  traced  and  built  afresh  with 
conscious  regard  to  the  new  means  of  transport. 
Gradients  that  are  possible,  if  not  easy,  to  the  horse 
that  carries  a  pack,  are  too  steep  for  him  when  he 


144  Florence  Past  and  Present 

must  pull  a  loaded  cart.  Thus,  if  the  power  of  the 
wheel  is  to  be  utilised,  this  means,  at  least  in  a  hilly 
country  like  Tuscany,  a  duplication  of  almost  the 
whole  system  of  roads  :  a  change  comparable  only 
to  that  seen  in  the  last  century  when  the  rail  came 
seeking  easier  gradients  still  at  the  bidding  and  for 
the  convenience  of  the  steam-dri\'en  wheel.  Thus 
at  the  com.ing  of  the  cart  the  physical  contours  and 
levels  of  the  country  once  more  imposed  themselves 
as  the  ultimate  conditions  with  which  man  must 
make  a  new  reckoning.  Inevitably,  under  natural 
law,  these  determined  the  place  and  passage  of  the 
roads  that  were  destined  to  prevail  ;  the  only  roads 
admitting  the  advantage  of  that  swifter  and  cheaper 
traffic  which  the  wheel  made  possible. 

Now  at  Florence  the  road  to  be  abandoned  in  the 
new  age  was  clearly  that  eastern  member  of  the 
V  which  had  brought  the  principal  traffic  to  the 
Mercatino  under  the  old  regime  ;  what  condemned 
it  was  the  steep  ascent  by  which  it  climbed  from 
San  Domenico  to  Fiesole,  and  what  took  its  place  was 
the  alternative  route  which  reached  the  Olmo  from 
Florence  by  the  easier  slope  of  the  Mugnonc  valle)'. 
Thus  the  first,  and  perhaps  most  remarkable,  effect 
of  the  altered  conditions  of  transport  is  the  pre- 
valence of  Florence  over  Fiesole.  The  town  by  the 
stream  must  always  have  had  an  advantage  in  the 
immediate  command  of  river  trade,  but  now,  with 
the    coming    of   wheeled    traffic,    this    advantage    is 


The  Development  of  Florence  145 

doubled  in  the  command  of  the  new  road  as  well. 
Fiesole  is  left  out  of  the  new  system,  and  sinks,  as 
we  ourselves  have  seen  towns  do  when  the  railway 
has  given  them  the  go-by  and  has  absorbed  the 
traffic  of  their  roads.  Florence  is  more  than  ever 
at  the  centre  of  things  ;  in  full  command  of  the 
carriage  roads  that  run  to  the  north  and  west. 

Nay,    further ;    within    Florence    itself,    the    new 
Centre,  as  determined   by  the   new   conditions,  can 
only  be  that  of  the  Mercato  :    the  cross-roads  that 
lie  so  near  the  Mugnone.     Here  the  carriage  road 
to  and  from  Faenza  arrives  by  the  line  of  the  Via 
San  Gallo  and  the  Borgo  San  Lorenzo,  and  hence 
departs  the  ancient  route,  equally  easy  for  wheels, 
which  leads  by  the  Via  Faenza  and  Rifredi  to  the 
Val  di  Marina  for  Barberino  and  Bologna.     This  is 
the  compitiini  which  was  marked,  till  lately,  by  the 
pillar  that  bore  the  goddess  of  the  cornucopia.     She 
can  hardly  have  been  other  than  the  Fortune — Nortia 
the  Etruscans  called  her — whose  most  constant  attri- 
bute   is    the    horn    of   plenty.       Her    Roman    name 
seems  to  mean  'the  bringer'  of  good  things,  and 
she  is  often  seen  with  the  ship  and  its  guiding  helm 
at  her  feet,  or  standing  on  the  wheel,  as  if  to  indicate 
the  means  by  which  plenty  blessed  the   land  from 
overseas,  or  came  up  country  from  port  to  market. 
She    is    essentially    Tuscan  —  Servius    Tullius,   the 
Etruscan,  introduced  her  to  Rome — and  she  must  be 
interpreted  by  Etruscan  trade  life  and  thought.     Her 

K 


146  Florence  Past  and  Present 

wheel  is  not  merely  such,  then,  as  in  early  Rome  led 
the  sheaves  home  in  the  wain,  or  carried  the  corn  to 
market.  Her  good  things  are  those  of  a  wide  com- 
merce by  land  and  sea,  and  here,  in  the  new  Centre 
of  Florence,  if  anywhere,  she  is  at  home  and  may 
claim  a  place.  For  if  Florence  rose  as  Fiesole  fell, 
and  if  her  Centre  moved  westward  to  the  cross-roads 
where  the  goddess  had  her  seat,  what  wrought  this 
change  and  secured  this  prosperity  was,  beyond  all 
question,  nothing  but  Nature  herself  guiding  the 
veritable  magic  of  the  wheel. 

The  new  Centre,  once  it  was  determined  at  the 
Mercato,  became  in  its  turn  a  determinant  of  the 
traffic  line  which  should  put  it  in  connection  with  the 
roads  which  left  the  opposite  bank  of  the  Arno  for 
the  south.  But  as  the  western  cross-roads  had  a  dis- 
tinctly religious  character,  it  is  still  on  ritual  lines 
that  this  later  link  is  laid.  The  former  age  had  traced 
with  the  sun  a  true  dcciinianus,  an  cast  and  west 
road,  in  the  Via  Sacra.  Here  and  now  comes  the 
Cardo,  the  absolute  north  and  south  road,  to  com- 
plete at  this  point  the  practice,  if  not  the  doctrine, 
of  the  Agrimensores  ;  you  may  trace  it  still  in  the 
Via  deir  Arcivescovado  and  the  Via  Calimara — the 
Cardo  Major  or  Calle  Mayor  —  of  Florence.^  In 
obedience  to  this  doctrine  of  the  heavens,  the  road 
that  comes  down  from  the  Mugnone,  on  a  line  nearly 

'  The  derivation  of  the  name  Calimara — often  in  dispute — is  thus 
simply  and  naturally  found. 


MERCATO    XUOVO;    NOKTH-UEST   CORNKK,    WITH    LKMONADE    STAI 


The  Development  of  Florence  149 

parallel  with  that  which  reached  the  Mercatino  from 
Fiesole,  becomes  at  the  Arcivescovado  a  true 
meridian,  and,  as  such,  crosses  the  decnmanus  of 
the  more  ancient  Via  Sacra  at  right  angles,  form- 
ing a  new  and  now  perfectly  regular  aviipituvi 
where  Fortune  has  her  seat ;  a  place  doubly  sacred 
under  this  fresh  ritual  consecration.  The  line  of 
the  Cardo  obeys  the  direction  that  religion  has 
given  it  as  far  as  the  corner  of  what  is  now  the 
Mercato  Nuovo,  where  natural  conditions  resume 
their  sway.  It  is  a  link  ready  to  bind  the  north 
roads  to  those  that  leave  the  left  bank  of  the  Arno 
for  the  south. 

If  this  union  is  to  be  accomplished  the  river  must 
be  crossed,  must  be  bridged  indeed,  since  Candeli 
has  set  the  fashion.  A  bridge,  then,  is  built  in  corre- 
spondence with  the  Cardo  ;  yet  not  exactl}%  for  the 
bridge  must  cross  the  water  at  right  angles  to  its 
course,  and  here  the  Arno  does  not  flow  due  east 
and  west.  Thus,  where  the  Cardo  ceases  to  be 
strictly  such  at  the  corner  of  the  Mercato  Nuovo,  it 
is  the  line  of  the  bridge — Ponte  Vecchio,  Florence 
calls  its  late  successor  now — which  the  road  assumes, 
ready  to  pass  over  these  arches,  and  to  make,  when 
it  has  crossed  them,  that  junction  with  the  southern 
trade  routes  which  obviously  meant  so  much  to  the 
new  Centre  that  Florence  had  found.  '  Nature  sup- 
planting religion,'  one  says  ;  yet  this  is  a  distinction 
too  superficial.      The  religion  of  those  days  and  of 


150  Florence  Past  and  Present 

this  place  was  nothing  if  not  nature-worship  ;  its 
rites  the  acknowledgment  of  the  powers  that  were, 
and  are,  in  heaven  and  earth.  The  Cardo  was  deter- 
mined by  the  sun  itself,  just  as  the  Decumanus  had 
been.  Yet  where  the  Cardo  changed  in  its  southern 
course,  the  new  determinant  was  but  that  other  line 
and  power  of  the  stream  of  which  the  Pontifex  was 
the  high  priest.  Fire  and  water  are  successively  at 
work  here  ;  nay,  as  water  is  powerless  till  it  move,  and 
depends  in  its  motion  on  the  sun,  it  is  still  the  force 
of  heaven,  directly  or  indirectly,  gathered  in  the  sun 
or  moving  in  the  stream,  that  rules  the  earth  and 
commands  the  obedience  of  men.  They  may  spell 
strangely  and  variously  the  Name  in  which  the  com- 
mand issues,  but  none  the  less  do  they  feel  the 
necessity  of  acknowledgment  and  of  submission, 
and,  thus  moved,  they  draw  the  main  lines  about 
which  Florence  has  ever  since  gathered  her  houses 
and  her  hearths. 

This  Centre,  with  its  symmetrical  cross-roads,  and 
this  bridge,  connecting  it  with  the  farther  bank  of 
the  stream,  are  the  main  determinants  of  the  city  as 
it  spreads  north  and  south  of  the  Arno  ;  all  the  rest 
is  a  mere  matter  of  development  along  these  lines. 
Such  development  cannot  here  be  traced  in  detail  ; 
rather  may  we  spend  a  moment  in  fixing,  as  far 
as  may  be,  the  chronology  of  the  movements  and 
changes  that  led  up  to  it.  The  middle  of  the  second 
millennium  i\.C.  has  seemed  a  [probable  date  for  the 


The  Development  of  Florence  151 

immigration  and  trade  that  left  their  traces  in  Pinti 
and  the  other  )it  names  on  the  route  to  Faenza.^ 
How  the  Villanovan  graves  of  the  Centre  are  to  be 
related  to  that  epoch  and  commerce  is  yet  uncertain; 
they  may  be  earlier,  or  contemporaneous,  but  can 
hardly  be  supposed  later  than  the  coming  of  the 
people  from  Zante.  The  Ouinto  tomb  is  clearly 
Mycenaean.  Helbig  dates  it  in  the  sixth  century 
B.C.,  but  remarks  that  its  construction  is  peculiarly 
primitive.  The  great  period  of  Mycenae  lay  four  or 
five  centuries  earlier,  and  there  is  no  apparent  reason 
why  this  sure  example  of  her  art  in  Italy  should  be 
brought  down  later  than  1000  B.C.  It  would  thus 
fall  outside  the  Etruscan  period,  and  be  a  product  of 
that  still  earlier  intercourse  with  Greece  and  the 
East  of  which  the  yEgaean  brooch  of  the  Centre  and 
the  nt  names  are  already  a  sufficient  proof 

The  coming  of  the  Etruscans  to  Italy  is  now 
tentatively  ascribed  to  the  eighth  century,-  and  a 
certain  time  is  further  allowed  for  their  full  conquest 
of  Tuscany.  The  building  and  occupation  of  Fiesole 
would  thus  fall  considerably  later  than  the  above 
date,  and  the  great  walls  that  defended  it  later  still. 
The  commercial  impulse  communicated  to  Florence 
by  this  conquest  and  neighbourhood — the  rise  of  the 
timber  trade  on  the  river,  of  agriculture  in  the  contado, 
and  the  new  activity  on  the  roads — can  hardly  be 

'  See  above,  p.  56. 

'■^  See  the  dictionary  of  I'auly-Wissowa,  s.v.  '  Etrusker. ' 


152  Florence  Past  and  Present 

supposed  earlier  than  500  B.C.,  probably  later.  Thus, 
were  the  Ouinto  tomb  Etruscan,  we  must  suppose 
it  even  less  ancient  than  the  date  given  by  Helbig. 
To  this  Etruscan  period,  however,  one  may  safely 
ascribe  the  building  of  the  bridge  at  Candeli. 

The  decline  of  the  Etruscan  power  in  Italy  is 
dated  with  certainty  from  396  B.C. ;  its  last  vain 
effort  against  the  advance  of  Rome  took  place  in 
the  year  283  at  Falerii.  The  Romans  secured  their 
conquest  in  a  period  of  road-building  which  fell 
between  218  and  163  B.C.,  closing  with  the  construc- 
tion of  the  Via  Cassia,  in  which  Florence  was  directly 
interested.  This,  then,  was  the  all-important  epoch 
of  the  coming  of  the  wheel  which  gave  Florence  her 
definite  superiority  over  Fiesole,  leaving  the  latter 
town  nothing  but  the  strategic  value  which  had  first 
drawn  attention  to  the  site  on  the  hill.  The  first 
bridge  at  Florence — the  original  Ponte  Vecchio — 
was  probably  as  Roman  as  the  road  it  served,  being 
the  Roman  answer  to  the  bridge  at  Candeli,  which 
belonged  to  the  earlier,  Etruscan,  order  of  things. 

A  hundred  years  later,  the  effect  of  the  road 
and  of  the  new  Centre  it  set  had  become  evident. 
The  bridge  had  superseded  the  ferry,  the  Mercato 
the  Mercatino,  and  the  Pinti  road,  once  the  chief 
line  of  trade  as  connecting  Fiesole  with  the  Arno, 
was  become  so  unimportant  that  I'lorence  built  her 
Amphitheatre  right  across  it.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  new  western  Centre  fully  justified  the  change  that 


The  Development  of  Florence  153 

had  drawn  the  town  thither.  In  82  B.C.  Florence 
was  a  '  municipium  splendidissimum,' ^  and,  though 
poHtical  rancour  then  decreed  her  destruction,  so 
definite  was  the  advantage  of  her  seat  that  no  other 
could  be  found,  or  was  thought  of,  when  she  rose 
again  as  a  Colony  of  the  Triumvirs  in  59.  Of  the 
earlier  Municipium  and  the  later  Colony  remains 
have  been  found  at  different  subterranean  levels 
higher  and  lower,  but  ever  in  such  a  disposition  as 
shows  that  both  rose  in  obedience  to  the  same 
directives :  the  Cardo  that  put  the  bridge  in  connec- 
tion with  the  north  road  by  the  Mugnone,  and  the 
still  more  ancient  Decumanus  b}'  which  the  Centre 
had  come  westward  from  the  Mercatino  to  the 
Mercato  :  from  the  arch  of  Janus  to  the  pillar  of 
Fortune.  When  one  describes  it  thus,  this  change — 
the  greatest  Florence  has  ever  known  —  becomes 
symbolic.  Henceforth  she  may  see  a  narrower 
Colony  come  to  replace  a  wider  Municipium,  or, 
otherwise,  a  new  city  rise  on  the  ruins  left  by 
barbarian  inroads,  but  her  waxing  and  waning  is 
only  the  contraction  and  expansion  of  a  heart  that 
may  beat  but  moves  not ;  she  has  found  her  seat, 
and  all  the  Fortune  that  such  a  situation  implies. 

1  Floius,  Kcr.  A'oTi!.,  iii.  21. 


II 

MATERIAL   SURVIVALS 


CHAPTER  VIII 

BOATS   AND   BOATMEN 

In  seeking  present  survivals  of  the  past  in  Florence 
one  naturally  recurs  to  the  two  great  elements  which 
determined  the  place  and  prosperity  of  the  city.  The 
first  of  these, — the  river — is  flowing  still,  and,  though 
the  life  and  traffic  of  the  Arno  are  sadly  fallen,  some- 
thing is  left  even  to-day  ;  there  are  still  boats  on  the 
stream,  moored  below  the  bridges  on  the  green  jade 
floor  the  flowing  water  lays  :  moored  in  the  purple 
shadows  of  wall  or  pier,  or  moving  up  and  down  as 
the  boatmen  punt  them  through  the  rippling  eddies 
with  their  long  poles.  Singular,  even  at  first  sight, 
in  their  ancient  build  and  high  sheer,  these  Arno 
boats  are  well  worth  a  particular  study.  They  have 
a  long  history  behind  them,  and  gather  to-day  what 
poor  remains  are  left  of  the  life  that  once  peopled 
the  stream  and  kept  it  busy. 

As  befits  a  survival,  the  type  of  the  Florentine 
boat  is  traditional,  and  is  reached  in  practice  not  b}- 
the  preparation  of  working  drawings  but  by  rule  of 
thumb.     Occasionally,  though  rarely,  a  boat  is  still 

157 


158  Florence  Past  and  Present 

built  in  the  outskirts  of  the  cit)-,  and  if  }'ou  chance 
on  such  a  case,  as  I  have  done — at  the  Anconella  or 
elsewhere — you  may  see  for  yourself  the  rough  and 
ready  method  that  still  }-ields,  as  of  old,  the  fine 
result.  The  working  practice  of  the  yard  is  as 
follows. 

A  centre-line  is  set  up  in  a  series  of  blocks  of 
stone.  The  boat  is  to  be  flat-bottomed,  and  the  first 
timber  laid  is  therefore  a  plank — the  tavolo  maestro — 
to  which  others  are  added  on  each  side  till  the  whole 
bottom  takes  shape  on  the  stones  in  the  form  of  a 
long  oval,  pointed,  and  sometimes  tilted,  at  each  end. 
This  bottom  is  called  \\\q  fondo.  The  high  stem  and 
stern-posts — the  rota  da  priia  and  rota  da  poppa — are 
then  keyed-in  at  each  end,  and  the  boat  begins  to 
take  shape,  ready  for  the  ribs,  the  thwarts  and  the 
sheathing  which  are  to  complete  it. 

The  rib,  or  palacanna  as  it  is  called  at  Florence, 
not  only  speaks  of  the  remote  past  in  its  name,  which 
is  purely  Greek,^  but  is  so  peculiar  and  character- 
istic a  part  of  the  boat  that  it  calls  for  particular 
description.  In  the  craft  to  which  we  are  accustomed 
the  rib  consists  of  two  symmetrical  halves  set  in  to 
the  central  line  of  the  keel  from  the  one  side  and  the 
other.  The  Florentine  boat  has  no  keel  but  a  flat 
floor,  and  the  rib  adapts  itself  to  these  altered  circum- 
stances.     It  has  two  parts,  but  these  are  not  equal, 

'  ElsL'wlicie  the  word  palacanna,  (jr  paraic/ialiiia,  is  used  of  the 
boat  itself:  the  part  for  the  whole,  as  \vc  call  a  boat  a  keel. 


Boats  and  Boatmen  159 

though  they  combine  in  a  symmetrical  form.  The 
longer  is  straight,  with  a  curve  at  one  end  like  a 
hockey  club.  The  straight  part — called  the  viadile — 
is  fixed  firmly  to  the  upper  side  of  the  boat's  bottom, 
which  it  completely  crosses  at  right-angles.  At  the 
edge  of  the/oudo  the  rib  curves  outwards  and  upwards 
at  one  side,  in  what  is  properly  \\\q.  palacarvia.  To 
balance  this  rising  curve  a  corresponding  piece,  but 
now  a  curve  onl\',  is  ke\-ed-in  to  the  opposite  end  of 
the  viadilc  at  the  other  edge  of  \}L\&fondo.  Thus  each 
rib  consists  of  a  short  and  a  long,  and  while  their 
joints  always  lie  along  the  edges  oi  \.\\Qfondo,  the  ribs 
are  set  so  that  their  shorts  and  longs  alternate,  giving 
alternately  a  joint  and  a  solid  rib  right  and  left  along 
each  side  of  the  boat's  bottom.  There  is  a  reason  for 
this  singularity.  The  system  of  alternate  joints 
secures,  as  perhaps  no  other  could  do,  the  combined 
stiffness  and  flexibility  so  useful  in  a  craft  that  is 
designed  for  the  Arno,  and  that  must  be  able  to  face 
shallows  as  well  as  deeps,  when  the  boatmen  drag  it 
over  the  gravel-bars  that  summer  has  left  between 
one  pool  and  another.  Before  leaving  the  ribs  it  may 
be  well  to  add  that  the  pair  next  the  stem  are  allowed 
to  project  above  the  gunwale,  and  are  joined  head  to 
head  by  a  curved  wooden  brace.  These  ribs  are 
called  monadicttc,  and  the  brace  the  forcaccio,  and 
the  arrangement  is  contrived  to  hold  turns  of  the 
mooring  rope  when  the  boat  lies  at  the  bank  or 
river  wall. 


i6o  Florence  Past  and  Present 

When  the  ribs  are  in  place,  and  trimmed  to  the 
sheer  the  builder  designs  for  his  boat,  he  binds  them 
together  from  stem  to  stern  outside  by  the  qiiadrati — 
the  upper  streak — to  which  corresponds,  within,  a 
similar  strip  of  planking  :  the  barganello.  These  are 
joined,  the  one  to  the  other,  over  the  rib-heads  by  the 
palchetta,  which  is  the  gunwale  proper.  Outside,  the 
qiiadratt  are  continued  downwards,  about  the  ribs  to 
the  fondo,  in  the  fascianie,  or  lower  streaks,  which 
form  the  shell  of  the  boat  from  the  floor  upwards. 
Within,  where  the  ribs  are  still  largely  visible,  a  lining 
of  movable  boards — the  palco,  or  false  floor — is  laid 
over  the  madili,  and  rises  on  each  side  some  wa}'  up 
the  palacarme,  serving  to  distribute  weight  and  pres- 
sure, and  save  ribs  and  bottom  when  the  boat  carries 
cargo  and  passengers.  In  the  bows,  under  t\\Q  for- 
caccia,  a  small  deck  roofs  in  XhQ  fruga,  as  it  is  called  ; 
the  locker  where  the  boatman  keeps  his  sundries,  or 
sometimes  his  catch  when  he  goes  a-fishing.  This 
last  use  has  given  its  name — \\\&  pcsciahiola — to  the 
loose  board  with  a  ring  which  serves  to  close  the 
fruga.  At  the  stern,  a  like  space  is  reserved  for  the 
prcddlino,  a  flat  wooden  platform  hardly  higher  than 
the  boards  of  \\\^  palco.  On  this  support  the  boatman 
rests  one  foot  as  he  punts,  while  the  other — right  or 
left  as  may  be — finds  higher  purchase  on  \hefatt07'ino, 
a  kind  of  round  thwart  which  crosses  the  boat  from 
side  to  side  just  above  the  step  where  the  prcdcllino 
drops  to  the  palco.     Here  too,  the  diaci,  or  tiller,  with 


Boats  and  Boatmen  i6i 

its  noble  downward  curve,  puts  him  in  touch,  even  if 
he  lie  at  ease,  with  the  high  rudder,  or  timone,  that 
guides  the  boat  as  it  drops  down-stream  with  the 
current.  When  he  punts,  the  boatman  finds  a  fulcrum 
for  his  pole  in  one  or  other  of  the  two  vogatoi,  or  row- 
locks, which  stand  up  in  the  heads  of  their  crutches 
from  Qiih^r  palchetta,  right  or  left.  The  painting  of 
the  boat  is  according  to  fancy,  but  generally  includes 
some  white,  in  single  or  double  streaks  below  the 
gunwale  fore  and  aft,  and  in  a  broad  band  on  the 
rudder.  A  barca,  or  river  boat,  of  the  size  commonly 
seen  at  Florence,  will  carry  some  12-15,000  Tuscan 
pounds  of  cargo,  and  costs  when  new  about  £\6. 
Oak  and  pine  are  the  woods  used  in  building  it,  but 
the  former — the  istia  they  call  it — is  preferred,  and, 
for  choice,  that  which  still  grows  on  the  heights  of  Le 
Cerbaie  by  the  marshes  of  Fucecchio,  the  famous 
querela  di  padule. 

It  is  time  to  pass  from  the  boat  itself  to  the  use 
that  is  made  of  it,  which,  at  Florence,  is  mostly  the 
gathering  and  carrying  of  the  river  sand.  The 
boatman  is  generally,  if  not  always,  a  reiiaiuolo,  or 
sand  collector  ;  one  who  lives  by  finding  and  bringing 
to  bank  what  the  river  in  flood  has  laid  down.  This 
debris  of  the  hills  is  what  first  filled  the  plain  that 
had  been  a  lake,  and  so  furnished — whether  the 
vehicle  was  Arno  or  Mugnone — the  foundation  on 
which  Florence  rose.  The  river  is  flowing  still,  and 
still  bringing  down  its  deposits,  and  the  sand  of  the 

L 


i62  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Arno  is  sought  to-day  as  of  old  by  those  who  have 
building  to  do  on  this  site. 

Once,  the  coarser  gravels  were  prized  as  material 
for  that  wonderful  calcistniz.zo ;  the  concrete,  hard  as 
rock  itself,  which  formed  the  heart  and  substance  of 
every  Florentine  wall,  of  palace  or  of  tower.  Beside 
all  its  other  advantages  the  site  of  the  city  had  this 
convenience  that  here  the  very  digging  of  founda- 
tions produced  most  of  the  material  required  for  the 
building  that  was  to  occupy  them.  The  pietra  forte 
of  the  hills,  the  uiacigiio  of  Fiesole,  were  indeed 
quarried  and  carried  hither,  but  only  to  serve  in 
small  pieces  as  the  wall  facing,  within  and  without. 
Between,  the  hollow  heart  of  the  wall  was  filled  wath 
river  gravel,  and  among  these  stones  was  poured  the 
fluid  mortar  that  the  finer  river  sands  helped  to 
compose  and  to  bind.  When  the  wall,  thus  built 
and  filled,  had  settled  and  set,  it  was  as  nearly 
indestructible  as  building  could  be,  and  owed  its 
strength  not  to  what  the  quarry  yielded,  but  rather 
to  the  skilful  use  of  what  the  river  had  brought,  the 
gravel  or  sand  that  in  cunning  proportion  formed  the 
wall-core.  This  manner  of  building  is  practised  no 
longer,  but  still,  though  the  gravel  is  seldom  sought, 
the  sand  is  in  constant  request,  for  Florence  grows 
in  every  direction,  and  without  sand  to  make  mortar, 
building,  even  as  practised  to-day,  cannot  go  on. 

In  the  neighbourhood  of  the  city  there  is  no 
eround  where  lake  water  has  not  Iain   and    left    its 


Boats  and  Boatmen 


t6 


deposits ;  hardl}'  anywhere  the  Arno,  Affrico,  and 
Mugnone,  in  their  floods,  wanderings,  and  constant 
changes,  have  not  again  and  again  passed  to  lay 
gravel  and  sand  in  alternate  beds  upon  the  blue 
clay  that  once  formed  the  lake  floor.  Digging  will 
find  sand  everywhere,  as  you  may  see  in  the  fields 


SAND-PITS    NEAR    VARLUNGO 


beyond  the  Madonnone  towards  Varlungo,  where 
the  sand-pits  call  the  builders'  carts,  and  the  whole 
structure  of  this  alluvium  is  laid  bare  down  to  the 
clay  itself  But  plainly  these  beds  are  the  work  of 
the  river  in  its  wanderings,  and  it  is  to  the  river  men 
still  turn  when  they  want  sand  of  the  finest,  and 
would  have  it  without  breaking  arable  land  or 
bending  to  the  labour  of  the  spade. 


164  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Not  every  sand-gatherer  can  afford  the  money 
that  would  make  him  the  owner  of  a  boat  ;  hence 
the  renaiuoli  are  divided  into  two  classes,  the 
barcainoli,  or  boatmen,  and  the  piaggiaiuoli  who 
keep  to  the  bank.  Every  flood  brings  these  men 
their  fresh  opportunity,  for,  as  the  Arno  rises  and 
changes  colour,  it  brings  down  anew  the  debris  of 
the  hills,  the  gravel  and  sand  ;  at  first  suspended  and 
transported,  then  sinking  as  the  water  turns  green 
again  ;  at  last  settled  in  some  new  arrangement  of 
deposits  on  the  river  bed. 

When  the  flood  has  passed  it  is  the  piaggiaiiiolo 
who  opens  the  work  of  dealing  with  what  it  has 
brought  down,  for  the  banks  he  labours  are  the 
first  ground  to  stand  clear  of  the  falling  waters. 
His  tools  are  the  spade  and  the  screen.  He  sets 
his  screen  among  the  mingled  sand  and  gravel 
of  the  shore  and  flings  against  it  what  he  digs 
up.  The  gravel  falls  back  from  the  screen,  the 
sand  passes,  and  forms  a  heap  behind,  ready  for 
carriage  to  some  larger  deposit  of  recovered  material 
which  the  wheelbarrow  reaches  along  a  path  of 
planks.  Meanwhile  the  screen  and  heap  mark  the 
centre  of  operations,  round  which,  within  the  shifting 
radius  that  the  plank  path  describes,  the  piaggiaiiiolo 
tries  for  sand  in  every  likely  spot.  It  is  hard  work 
and  hot,  as  the  sun  beats  white  on  the  gravel  banks, 
and  the  men  are  apt  to  throw  off  all  clothing  but 
a  ragged  shirt  and  sash,  showing  limbs  bronzed  and 


Boats  and  Boatmen 


165 


muscular  as  those  of  any  ancient  statue.  You  may 
see  them  thus  at  work  any  fine  day  after  flood, 
below  the  river  wall  of  the  Lung'  Arno  Vespucci,  as 
if  time  had  made  no  progress,  and  life  at  Florence 
were  still  what  it  once  was,  savage  and  primitive. 

The  barcaiuoli,  on  the  other  hand,  are  the  aristocrats 
among    these    river   workers ;   owning  craft   of  their 


I'lAGGIAIUOLI    AT   WORK    UNDER    LUNG'    ARNO   VESPUCCI 


own,  and  using  their  boats  to  seek  under  water  the 
last  and  finest  sands  that  the  falling  flood  deposits : 
you  will  find  them  busy  as  soon  as  the  river  gives 
sign  in  its  change  of  colour  that  what  it  held 
suspended  has  fallen  to  the  bottom.  They  know 
the  Arno  from  boyhood,  and  punt  their  light  craft 
with  skill  till  the  boat  lies  right  over  the  new  sand- 
bank on  which  they  mean  to  work.     The  pole,  rather 


1 66  Florence  Past  and  Present 

than  the  oar,  is  what  they  use  in  this  progress,  for 
so  they  are  in  constant  and  sensitive  contact  with 
the  river  bed  ;  not  only  moving  up  and  down,  but 
trying  the  ground  as  they  go.  They  stop  when  the 
pole  tells  them  ;  where  the  river  has  just  laid  what 
they  are  seeking.     Then  the   pole  is  exchanged  for 


BARCAIUOLO    LIFTING    A    SCOOPFUI,   OF   SAND 

the /^  a /a,  and  the  work  of  getting  the  sand  on  board 
begins. 

The  /)(r/tr  differs  from  the  punting  pole  only  in 
having  an  iron  scoop  fixed  at  one  end.  Standing  on 
\{\Q  prcdcllitio,  one  foot  braced  firmly  on  ih^zfattoriiio, 
the  boatman  lets  go  his  pala  till  the  scoop  touches 
bottom  and  enters  the  sand-bed.     Slowly,  laboriously, 


Boats  and  Boatmen  169 

with  tact  to  skim  the  finest  layers  and  strength  and 
supple  skill  of  wrist  at  the  upward  heave  and  rising 
turn  and  discharge,  the  sand  is  secured,  a  scoopful  at 
a  time,  and  heaped  on  the  palco  amidships  till  the 
boat  sinks  to  the  very  water-line  and  limit  of  its 
capacity.  The  sand  that  comes  up  wet  and  shining 
in  the  scoop  dulls  in  a  flash  as  the  water  drains  out 
of  it.  Alike  on  board  and  on  shore  the  heaps  grow 
slowly,  like  mounds  of  grey  sugar,  as  load  after  load 
is  completed  and  brought  to  bank  ;  these  are  the 
boatman's  riches,  the  gains  of  his  skill,  strength,  and 
patience. 

Work  with  the  pala  would  be  even  harder  than  it 
is  were  it  not  that  the  boatman  has  the  art  to  use  the 
pole  of  his  tool  as  a  lever,  finding  a  fulcrum  for  it 
on  the  gunwale  of  the  boat,  and  throwing  all  his 
weight  inwards  on  the  upper  end  of  the  pole.  This 
trick  has  brought  about  the  addition  of  four  pieces 
to  the  harca — the  regoli — notched  to  take  the  pole 
of  the  pala,  and  fixed  to  the  gunwale  fore  and  aft, 
two  on  each  side,  to  strengthen  the  boat  at  these 
chief  points  of  wear  and  strain.  The  regoli,  as  mere 
additions,  can  be  easily  replaced  as  soon  as  they  are 
worn  out. 

In  the  disposing  of  the  sand  he  has  won  from 
the  river,  neither  barcahwlo  nor  piaggiainolo  deals 
directly  with  the  builder  who  requires  it.  They  are 
not  his  servants,  nor  any  one  else's,  but  master- 
workmen  free  to  dispose  of  their  gains  as  best  they 


lyo  Florence  Past  and  Present 

may.  In  this  liberty  the  renainoli  turn  to  another 
class  and  trade,  that  of  the  barocciai,  the  carters  who 
act  as  middlemen  in  the  business.  The  renaiiiolo 
sells  to  the  barocciaio,  and  he  again  to  the  builder 
at  an  advance  which  pa}'s  for  the  carriage.  At 
present,  sand  is  bought  and  sold  at  a  price  which  may 
be  as  much  as  six  lire  per  cart  load,  at  a  time  of 
great  demand  ;  the  price  tending  to  rise  with  the  late 
activity  of  the  building  trade  at  Florence.  If  you 
ask  the  renaiuolo,  he  will  allow  that  his  working  day 
is  worth  anything  between  seven  and  ten  lire.  It 
must  be  remembered,  however,  that  the  river  is  not 
always  in  order,  and  the  average  gains  in  this  trade 
may  therefore  be  taken  at  four  lire  per  day,  or,  say, 
£,^0  a  year.  Florence  holds  and  employs  about 
one  hundred  and  twenty  renainoli,  of  whom  eighty  or 
so  may  be  barcaiiioli  and  forty  piaggiainoli.  This 
means  that  sand  is  taken  from  the  Arno  to  the  yearly 
value  of  some  £6000 ;  no  contemptible  gain,  when 
the  state  of  the  stream  and  the  general  conditions  of 
life  in  Florence  are  considered. 

The  freedom  of  the  renainoli  in  their  work  may  be 
taken  as  a  sign  that  their  trade  is  not  only  ancient, 
but  has  preserved  much  of  its  primitive  character  in 
so  late  a  liberty.  For  it  is  certain  that  in  the  evolution 
of  Florentine  industries  it  was  just  this  freedom,  once 
the  boast  of  every  workman,  that  the  Guilds  of  the 
Middle  Age  confined  and  destroyed  ;  making  the 
artisan    the   bondservant   of  the   capital   they   repre- 


Boats  and  Boatmen  171 

sented.  But  ask  him  to-day,  and  any  reiiaiiiolo  will 
tell  you  that  his  kind  and  class  have  no  trade 
organisation  ;  they  remain,  then,  what  they  have 
always  been,  each  man  free  to  work  as  seems  best  to 
himself  and  on  his  own  account.  Thus  the  whole 
Middle  Age  has  passed  without  changing  a  whit  the 
life  or  liberty  of  the  river,  which,  flowing  still,  still 
gathers  on  its  banks  and  bosom  men  that  represent 
to-day,  in  the  independence  of  their  activity,  another, 
earlier,  world  of  primitive  labour. 

Though  unorganised,  the  renaiuoli  form  a  distinct 
class,  with  strong  class-feeling,  and  a  high  jealousy  of 
their  privilege  in  the  common  use  of  the  river  and  its 
shores.  The}-  will  unite  to  defend  rights  here  which 
are  theirs  by  no  statute  but  that  of  immemorial  use 
and  wont.  If  you  would  know  it,  send  a  servant  to 
fetch  you  a  load  of  sand  from  the  river.  He  must 
either  buy  it  from  the  renaiuoli,  or  pay  his  footing  on 
the  shore  in  one  form  or  other  before  they  will  allow 
him  to  work  for  you  on  ground  they  claim  as  their 
own.  In  this  property  one  finds  a  survival  of  the 
primitive  community,  which  held  its  ground  in 
common  while  uniting  to  defend  these  common-rights 
against  all  outsiders.  The  tendency  of  language 
among  the  renaiuoli  to  break  up  into  dialect  has 
already  shown  us  ^  how  nearly  primitive  their  life  still 
is,  and,  as  we  proceed,  it  will  still  further  appear  that 
early  half- forgotten    things,  like  water-spirits,   haunt 

^  See  above,  p.  90. 


1 72  Florence  Past  and  Present 

to-day  the  banks  of  the  Arno  and  the  minds  of  the 
men  that  make  their  home  by  the  stream. 

The  roiaiuolo,  whether  he  work  on  the  bank  or 
afloat,  is  not  always  in  search  of  sand  ;  he  is  a  true 
child  of  the  Arno,  ready  to  seek  anything  the  river 
may  yield.  When  the  demand  for  sand  falls  off,  or 
the  supply  is  scanty,  he  does  not  remain  idle  but  sets 
at  once  to  fishing.  The  Florentine  is  fond  of  fish, 
but  cannot  have  it  from  the  sea  save  at  a  high  price, 
or  of  doubtful  freshness.  The  Arno  fishermen,  who 
are  no  other  than  the  renaiuoli,  cater  in  this  kind  for 
the  common  people  ;  you  will  see  their  catch  laid  out 
on  the  counter  of  the  Rosticceria — that  peculiarly 
Florentine  institution — or  may  notice  the  sign  '  Pesci 
d' Arno '  painted  at  a  Trattoria  door  in  city  or  country 
to  draw  custom.  In  the  good  old  days  of  a  hundred 
years  ago,  those  who  took  their  morning  bath  in  the 
river  used  to  follow  it  up  by  a  visit  to  '  II  Dottore,' 
the  host  who  dispensed  fried  Arno  fish  to  all  comers 
at  the  Piagentina.  On  the  same  spot,  or  near  it,  a 
humble  house  of  call  at  Bellariva  still  offers  the  same 
dish,  which  those  who  fancy  it  consume  to  the  accom- 
paniment of  a  certain  white  wine  not  to  be  despised. 
Close  by  live  the  fishermen  ;  their  boats  line  the  shore 
in  front,  and  this  branch  of  the  rcnaiuold s  activity 
may  occupy  our  attention  for  a  moment  ;  the  more 
that,  being  what  he  is,  he  is  sure  to  display  in  this 
craft  also  the  manner  and  practice  of  forgotten  time. 

Just  as  when  he  seeks  sand  the  renaiuolo  is  either 


Boats  and  Boatmen 


173 


2l  piaggiahiolo  or  a  barcaiuolo,  so,  when  he  suffers  a 
river  change  and  turns  fisherman,  he  fishes  either 
from    the   bank    or — if   he   have   it   at   command — 


pp' ' 

V 

.     ^. 

-t^-Y« 

\ 

\ 

^•..     , 

-i 

,■., 

f 

&^'  ,  ;■- 

\ 

k 

^■>.&      . 

;  < 

^,    r  ■ 

fisherman's    house,    with    GIACCHIO    HUNG   OUT   TO   DRY 

from  a  boat  on  the  stream,  but  never  with  rod  and 
Hne,  which  he  leaves  in  a  certain  contempt  to  the 
amateur.  His  tool  here  is  the  net,  in  a  remarkable 
variety  of  size,  shape,  and  use.  Those  cast  from  the 
shore,  set  under  the  stream,  or  dipped  and   pushed 


174  Florence  Past  and  Present 

before  the  wader,  are  the  common  bilaiicia,  which  you 
may  see  any  day  swinging  from  its  cord  and  pole  ; 
the  elegant  giaccJiio,  weighted  with  leads,  and  used 
like  a  sling  ;  the  caccia  and  trappoln  on  their  frames 
Hke  shrimping  nets  ;  the  ripainolix,  used  to  follow  the 
fish  under  the  river  bank  in  time  of  flood  ;  and, 
finally,  the  bertaile,  a  bag-net  stretched  on  rings  set 
within  a  frame  of  three  osiers.^  This  last  net  is 
trapped  at  the  mouth  and  anchored  under  water  in 
the  fish-runs.  The  bilancia  is  sometimes  used  from 
the  windows  of  houses  overlooking  the  river.  Some 
years  ago,  when  looking  at  an  apartment  in  Borgo 
San  Jacopo,  I  was  bid  to  notice  a  crane  and  pulley 
fixed  to  the  wall  of  the  house  for  the  management  of 
such  a  net :  '  So,'  they  said,  'you  can  draw  up  your 
breakfast  without  pa}-ing  for  it.' 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  the  fisher  is  a  harcaiuolo — 
one  who  commands  a  boat — his  net  is  apt  to  be  the 
bertailone ;  much  larger  and  heavier  than  any  of  the 
others,  but,  for  that  very  reason,  enclosing  more 
water  and  securing  a  better  catch  of  fish  if  fortune 
favour  the  fishers.  The  bcrt(nlo)ic  consists  of  netting- 
some  sixty  feet  long  by  six  feet  deep,  with  leads  be- 
low and  corks  above.  Two  bertaili,  with  their  traps 
and    rings,    but   without    framework,    are  set    in   the 

^  Rigutini-Fanfani  registers  the  forms  bcrtitiUo,  hcrtovcUo  and  fierla- 
hello  as  the  names  of  this  net,  and  beriavello  is  also  found.  The  words 
bertaile  and  bertailone,  unknown  to  the  dictionaries,  were  taken  down 
by  me  with  great  care  from  a  working  fisherman  at  the  Ponte  di 
Ferro.     They  are  the  Florentine  variants  of  the  others. 


:^4iiisiiiil 


\^' 


■v*.' 


,.,-.Xt-r«---. 


1    ^ 


BILAXCIA    AT    A    BALCONY    IN    liOKGO    SAN    lACOI'O 


Boats  and  Boatmen  177 

bertailone  at  equal  distance  to  act  as  pockets  for  the 
catch,  and  in  this  situation  are  known  as  gole.  The 
bertailone  is  sometimes  used  without  these,  in  which 
case  it  is  called  the  strascino.  The  Arno  nets  are  all 
home  and  hand-made ;  the  work  of  the  men  them- 
selves, or  of  their  women-kind,  in  spare  hours.  The 
cord  and  mesh  are  fine,  the  needle  remarkable,  shaped 
of  wood  by  the  workman  himself  with  a  pocket  knife. 
Square  in  section,  hardly  thicker  than  a  lead  pencil, 
this  ago,  as  it  is  called,  opens  towards  the  point  in  a 
single  eye,  large  enough  to  carry  the  cord  which  is 
wound  on  a  central  spine  left  uncut  in  the  axis  of  the 
oblong  eye  itself  Such  refined  home  handicrafts 
speak  of  immemorial  tradition,  implying  as  they  do 
a  transmitted  dexterity  which  the  rougher  labours  of 
the  renaiuolo  on  the  river  have  not  been  able  to 
destroy. 

It  is  interesting  to  watch  the  bertailone  dX  work,  as 
you  may  often  do  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  Ponte 
di  Ferro.  The  men — two  or  three  in  number — are  in 
the  boat ;  the  net  lies  heaped  in  a  mass  on  the  roof 
oiAh&frnga,  but  a  stout  cord  anchors  one  end  of  the 
bertailone  to  the  shore.  As  the  boat  moves  into 
the  current  and  down-stream,  the  net  is  payed  out,  so 
that  at  last,  when  anchored  again  by  the  other  end 
some  way  off,  it  stands  in  a  great  curve  of  which  the 
shore  forms  the  chord.  W^ithin  the  net  the  boat 
moves  slowly  up  and  down,  while  the  men  stab  and 
churn   with  their  poles  to    rouse    the  fish,  which — in 

M 


1 78  Florence  Past  and  Present 

winter  especially — are  apt  to  lie  in  the  mud,  or  under 
the  stones  of  the  river  bottom.  Half  an  hour  passes 
in  this  work,  and  then  the  net  is  carefully  drawn 
aboard  again  ;  the  men  meanwhile  thrashing  the 
water  with  the  leads  to  drive  the  fish  into  the  pockets. 
When  these  come  aboard,  the  pcsciaiuola  is  lifted  ; 
first  one  gola  and  then  the  other  is  untied  at  the 
point,  and  the  fish  poured  like  a  stream  of  silver  into 
\\\Q.frnga.  I  have  seen  fifteen  pounds  of  fish  taken 
in  this  way  by  one  cast  of  the  bcrtaiknie  on  a  gray  day 
in  January  ;  mostly  small  fry  indeed,  but  with  them 
lay  a  brown  carp  of  three  pounds  weight.  My  friend 
the  barcaiuolo  told  me  afterwards  that  he  had  kept 
this  fish  for  himself,  and  that  it  '  ate  like  butter,' 

More  picturesque,  if  not  more  profitable,  is  the 
night  fishing  with  hand-net  and  lantern  which  you 
may  see  in  the  soft  summer  darkness  as  you  look 
from  the  Ponte  alia  Carraia  towards  the  weir  and  the 
Cascine.  On  the  right,  in  the  still  water  above  the 
weir,  the  lamps  of  the  Lung'  Arno  shine  reflected  ; 
the  ripple  of  the  river  makes  them  look  like  long 
spools  on  which  the  river-spirits  are  for  ever  winding 
gold  and  silver  thread.  But  it  is  beyond  and  below 
the  weir  that  other,  fainter,  points  of  fire,  as  they  flit 
hither  and  thither  among  the  scanty  streams  and 
heaped  gravels,  show  that  the  fisher  is  on  foot  and  at 
work.  He  carries  a  tin  lantern — the  forgnolo — in  his 
left  hand,  and  in  his  right  the  forcJietta  or  leister. 
Thus  he  wades  the  water,  dazzling  and  drawing  the 


Boats  and  Boatmen  179 

fish  within  reach,  and   spearing  as   many  as   come 
under  his  hand. 

So  then,  by  day  or  night,  from  boat  or  shore,  with 
one  kind  of  net  or  another,  the  fishers  of  the  Arno 
supply  the  humbler  Florentine  market.  The  fish 
they  bring  in  are  of  several  kinds,  some  eight  or  so 
in  all.  There  are  the  lascJic  {Leuciscus  aula),  well 
known  from  Vasari's  tale  of  the  painter  Buffalmacco, 
who  crowned  his  figure  of  St.  Ercolano  with  these 
fish  at  Perugia  ;  they  are  found  in  the  Arno  as  well 
as  in  Trasimene.  There  are  the  eels  {Anguilla 
vulgaris)  too,  in  their  season  ;  about  which  the  fisher- 
men will  tell  you  strange  tales,  not  forgetting  the 
congers  of  the  sea — the grogni  as  they  are  called — how 
they  pour  foam  from  their  mouths  by  the  sea-shore  in 
the  breeding  season  ;  how,  as  they  move  up-stream, 
you  may  hear  them  among  the  gravel  of  the  river 
making  a  noise  like  the  humming  of  a  hundred 
wheels.  These  angjtille  seek  the  sea  in  autumn,  and 
mount  the  Arno  again  in  the  storms  and  floods  ot 
Januar)'  and  February,  when  they  are  taken  at  the 
weirs  in  cleverly  contrived  traps  of  osier.  Even 
science  confesses  that  there  is  mystery  here,  and  that 
a  true  male  of  this  species  is  unknown.^     Then  there 

^  Cav.  V.  A.  Vecchi  tells  me  that  the  lower  Arno  as  far  as  Castel- 
franco  di  Sotto  is  visited  occasionally  by  the  touno  {Thymus  vulgaris) 
and  regularly  by  the  pilchard  [Cliipea  pilchardus).  The  latter  is 
known  on  the  Arno  as  the  cheppia  and  is  thought  a  great  delicacy  ; 
to  eat  which  many  make  the  journey  to  Castelfranco  in  the  tishing 
season. 


i8o  Florence  Past  and  Present 

are  the  broccioli  {Gohio  fluviatilis^  Cuv,),  and  the 
barbi  {Baj'bus  plebeins,  Val.),  but  the  latter  is  a  fish  to 
be  eaten  cautiously  as  the  roe  is  poisonous.  Some- 
times unpleasant  consequences  follow  a  meal  of  Arno 
fish,  and  the  sufferers  from  such  an  accident  are  apt 
to  suppose  that  the  state  of  the  river  is  to  blame.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  no  sewage  enters  the  Arno  at 
Florence,  and  a  few  barbi,  carelessly  cleaned,  are 
quite  enough  to  account  for  the  illness  of  a  whole 
party.  The  boga  (Gobi us  dvcniensis)  is  a  species 
peculiar  to  the  Arno,  and  with  it  may  be  mentioned 
various  kinds  of  trout  and  pike.  But  the  finest  fish 
got  at  Florence  is  the  carp  already  spoken  of 
{Cj'/>ri}iiis  carpio),  here  known  as  the  rcina.  At 
Rome  it  is  called,  more  amply  and  exactly,  '  the  dark 
queen,'  or  'the  dark  queen  in  gauze  of  gold,'  from 
the  superb  lustre  of  its  scales,  which  change  from 
smoke  colour  to  golden  brown  as  the  light  catches 
them.  It  runs  to  several  pounds  weight,  and  in 
quality  as  well  as  beauty  is  a  true  queen  of  the  river  : 
the  best  fish  Florence  knows.  The  trade  of  the  fisher 
is  not  unprofitable  ;  one  da\-  with  another,  he  will 
take  an  average  of  five  francs'  worth  from  the 
river.  This  is  not  enough,  as  one  sees,  to  tempt  the 
renaiuolo  to  forsake  the  sand,  which  pays  him  still 
better ;  but  when  the  sand  forsakes  him,  rather 
than  remain  idle,  he  turns  fisherman  and  thus 
fairly  maintains  the  average  of  his  daily  takings 
from  the  Arno. 


Boats  and  Boatmen  i8i 

Now  this  change  is  a  falHng  back  upon  what  we 
have  alread}'  noted  as  one  of  the  two  absolutely 
primitive  and  original  occupations  of  man  in  the 
Arno  valley.  That  fishing  still  goes  on  in  Florence 
is  of  itself  a  genuine  survival  of  the  first  human  age 
here,  but  it  is  possible  to  go  further,  and  find  in  the 
hands  of  the  Arno  fishermen  to-day  something  that 
connects  his  art  in  a  definite  and  interesting  way  with 
the  earliest  days  of  all.  This  object  is  the  gourd,  and 
to  the  gourd  then,  in  the  use  the  fisher  makes  of  it, 
some  particular  attention  is  now  due. 

If  the  net  serves  to  take  the  fish,  it  is  the  gourd 
to  which  the  catch  is  transferred  for  safe  keeping  ; 
at  least  b)-  those  fishers  who  walk  or  wade  afoot, 
and  who,  working  from  the  bank  or  the  shore,  have 
no  boat  with  its  convenient  y>7/i,'-^z  in  which  to  bestow 
their  catch.  The  gourd  is  carried  slung  to  the 
waist  of  the  fisherman,  and  the  swelling  curves  of 
this  dry  and  hollow  fruit  have  their  own  place  in 
the  picture  he  presents ;  emphasising  by  contrast 
the  finer  lines  of  his  figure  as  he  moves  like  some 
antique  bronze  into  which  the  spirit  of  the  stream 
has  breathed  its  own  life.  You  may  meet  him,  too, 
any  day  in  the  poorer  streets  of  Florence  selling 
what  he  has  caught,  but  always  from  the  convenient 
gourd  by  the  help  of  a  portable  balance.  His  long- 
drawn  cry  tells  you  he  is  coming  in  the  crowd,  and, 
as  he  leaves  you  to  try  another  beat,  his  gourd  is 
the  last  you  see  of  him  as  he  turns  the  corner. 


1 82  Florence  Past  and  Present 

The  ziicca,  as  the  gourd  is  called  here,  in  all  its 
forms,  long,  middling,  and  round,  is  a  familiar  object 
at  Florence  ;  its  deep  orange  flesh  shows  all  winter 
on  the  stall  of  the  greengrocer,  for,  cooked  secundum 
arteni,  with  onion  and  pepper,  it  makes  a  dish  not 
to  be  despised.  The  seeds,  like  those  of  the  melon, 
are  dried,  salted,  and  sold  as  nuts  for  eating  ;  they 
are  the  whitish  seiui,  with  a  green  kernel,  offered  by 
measure  on  the  bridges  and  in  the  humbler  circuses 
as  a  diversion  and  pastime  during  the  performance. 
In  another  fashion,  emptied  and  dried,  the  gourd 
serves  as  a  vessel,  and  often  forms  part  of  the 
furniture  of  the  kitchen  in  the  poorer  Italian  houses, 
especial!}'  in  the  country.  It  is  commonly  used  to 
hold  salt,  and  the  Zucca  da  scde  has  become  pro- 
verbial :  a  phrase  doubly  fit,  as  carrying  much  of 
that  subtler  salt  which  is  the  Florentine  wit.  To 
taste  this,  one  must  remember  that  '  zucca,'  like 
our  own  '  nut,'  is  current  slang  for  the  head  ;  a  bald 
man,  for  instance,  will  often  be  addressed  as  '  zucca 
pelata.'  'Zucca  mia  da  sale!'  How  much,  then, 
does  such  an  apostrophe  not  imply  ?  '  'Tis  easy 
to  see  you  come  from  the  country — are  a  country 
pumpkin — have  a  head  indeed,  but  lack  the  wit 
your  head  should  hold.'  Still  subtler  and  nearer 
our  subject  is  the  form  '  hai  venduto  il  pesce,'  which 
means  'you  have  nothing  in  your  gourd — your  head 
is  empty  of  all  but  air.'  Such  covert  forms  of  scorn 
are  peculiarly  Florentine. 


Boats  and  Boatmen  183 

The  gourd  has  long  served  to  hold  liquids  as  well 
as  solids.  Pliny  says  that  in  his  day  wine  was 
often  thus  kept,  and  that  there  was  a  new  fashion 
for  the  gourd  as  a  utensil  in  the  bath  :  ^  no  doubt 
as  a  ladle  for  hot  or  cold  water ;  unless,  indeed, 
we  should  think  here  of  the  loofah.  The  use 
of  the  gourd  is  thus  undoubtedly  ancient,  and 
at  Florence  to-day,  in  the  hands  of  the  fishermen 
of  the  Arno,  it  represents,  as  we  shall  see,  a 
whole  technique — a  manner  of  cultivation  and  pre- 
paration— which,  derived  from  early  times,  is  still 
known  and  practised  by  these  simple  Tuscan 
people. 

Nature  gives  two  principal  shapes  to  this  fruit, 
the  long  and  the  round  ;  both  useful  in  their  different 
ways  as  vessels  for  holding  liquids  or  solids,  even  if 
only  emptied  and  dried  in  their  natural  form.  I 
once  saw  a  curious  instance  of  this  at  a  rustic  festa 
under  the  chestnut-trees  of  Piedmont.  A  man  came 
on  the  ground  with  wine,  carrying  it  on  his  person 
in  a  long  twisted  gourd,  which,  as  he  was  not  very 
tall,  clung  to  his  whole  body  from  head  to  heel. 
Below,  the  gourd  was  strapped  to  his  ankle,  and 
when  a  thirsty  soul  came  near  he  kicked  up  his 
heel,  opened  a  plug  in  the  gourd,  and  filled  a  glass 
for  him  in  a  moment.  Such  forms  have,  however, 
their  obvious  awkwardnesses,  and  Pliny,  who  registers 
them  as  the  '  draconis  intorti  figura,'  hints  at  some- 

'  N.II.,  xix.  5. 


1 84 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


thing  more  handy  when  he  says  of  the  gourd  '  crescit 
qua  cogitur  forma.'  ^ 

Such,  then,  is  the  practice  at  Florence.     The  fisher- 
men of  the   Arno  scorn   to  buy  their  zticche ;  they 


ENGRAVING    DONE    BY    HAND    ON    A    WINE-GOUKI) 


grow  them  in  their  gardens,  and  still  know  the  art 
of  vegetable  modelling  by  which  the  fruit,  as  it 
swells,  takes    the    shape    they  need.     The  old    men 

'  N.H.,  loc.  cit.  A  trumpet-sliaped  gourd  dried  and  opened  at 
both  ends  is  sometimes  used  in  Tuscany  as  a  horn  to  call  pigs.  There 
is  an  example  of  such  a  horn  in  the  Museo  Etnografico,  Florence. 


Boats  and  Boatmen  185 

from  the  country  whom  you  may  see  hawking  small 
gourds  about  the  streets  in  autumn  have  nothing 
to  do  with  the  river;  '  donne,  o  donne'  is  their  cry, 
for  the  vessels  they  sell  are  only  good  to  hold  the 
drysaltery  of  the  poorer  homes.  Nor  does  the 
fisherman  sow  cJiiatte  in  his  ground  :  the  flat  gourd 
used  still  as  a  wine  flask,  and  often  highly  orna- 
mented with  elaborate  graffito.  The  fruit  for  his 
purpose  is  larger,  and  such  as,  if  left  to  its  natural 
growth,  would  give  a  massive  pear-shaped  pumpkin. 

But  these  gourds  are  not  left  to  nature.  The 
fisherman  needs  them  broad  based  that  they  may 
stand  upright  by  themselves,  and  secures  this  shape 
by  setting  a  board  under  the  fruit  as  it  ripens  ;  the 
weight  of  the  gourd  as  it  finds  the  wood  and  settles 
on  it  does  what  he  wants.  Meanwhile  the  neck  is 
taking  shape  under  a  tight  bandage  which  confines 
the  gourd  above,  and  only  allows  it  to  swell  where 
size  is  needed  in  the  body  of  the  completed  vessel. 
When  the  gourd  is  ready  it  is  cut,  emptied,  and  laid 
to  dry  in  the  cottage  window. 

It  is  easy  to  see,  however,  that,  even  when  shaped 
and  dried,  the  gourd  is  not  yet  ready  for  service.  It 
cannot  be  used  to  hold  fish  till  it  has  been  made 
waterproof  within,  for,  unprotected,  the  vegetable 
matter  of  which  it  consists  would  quickh'  take  the 
water  again,  would  swell  and  rot  so  as  to  become 
useless.  The  art  which  completes  the  whole  process 
is  after  all  a  very  simple  one.     Pitch  is  melted  over 


1 86  Florence  Past  and  Present 

the  fire  and  poured  into  the  dry  gourd,  which  the 
fisherman  then  turns  about  in  his  hands  till  the  whole 
is  lined,  to  the  lip  and  beyond  it,  with  a  black 
resistant  varnish.     So  prepared,  you  will  see  gourds 


fisherman's  gourd  lined  with  pitch 

hanging  for  sale  at  the  doors  of  dealers  in  fishing 
tackle  ;  they  are  now  ready  to  hold  safely  what  the 
net  brings  in. 

Now  this  art  of  the  gourd  deserves  the  particular 
attention  we  have  given  it  because  it  is  a  distinct 
survival    of  the   earliest   times    and  explains    much 


Boats  and  Boatmen  187 

that  might  otherwise  be  unintelligible.  When  Pliny 
tells  that  wine  was  often  stored  in  gourds/  we 
remember  that  the  old  world  had  the  habit — still  kept 
up  in  Greece — of  treating  wine  with  pitch  to  make 


EARTHENWARE   JAR    GLAZED    WITHIN 

it  keep  better,  or  to  give  it  a  favourite  flavour. 
But  so,  it  seems  certain  that  this  practice  was 
derived  from  that  we  have  just  studied.  The 
gourd — and  for  that  matter  the  amphora  too,  before 
the    invention    of  glaze — could    not    hold    wine    till 

'  N.H.,  loc.  cil. 


r88  Florence  Past  and  Present 

lined  with  pitch. ^  The  liquor  gained  sharpness  in 
this  contact  ;  the  consumer  learned  to  prefer  such 
wines,  and  so,  even  when  pottery  and  vitreous 
glaze  had  come  to  abolish  the  first  necessity,  the 
vintner  still  treated  his  wine  with  pitch  to  meet 
an  established  taste.  The  re.'^iiiato  of  Greece  is  a 
survival  from  the  times  of  the  primitive  gourd  and 
its  necessary  preparation  as  a  wine  vessel.  So  too  in 
Tuscany  to-day  the  rough  earthenware  of  the  house- 
hold is  porous  as  any  ancient  amphora  till  glazed. 
The  glaze  is  often  applied  to  the  inside  of  the  pot 
only,  in  the  very  manner  of  the  pitch  whose  colour  it 
so  nearly  imitates,  and  is  to  be  seen  spilt  carelessly 
over  the  lip,  just  as  the  pitch  shows  a  little  outside 
the  gourd  ;  the  tecJiniquc  used  in  the  preparation  of 
this  earlier  vessel  has  clearly  passed  from  the  fisher- 
man to  the  potter. 

It  would  seem  indeed  that  not  the  glaze  only,  but 
the  pottery  itself  may  have  come  of  that  still  earlier 
practice  in  which  men  adapted  the  gourd  to  their  use 
as  a  convenient  vessel.  I  believe  that  M.  Goguet 
has  the  credit  of  first  suggesting  that  clay  may 
originally  have  been  used  to  protect  a  gourd  or 
basket  in  its  employment  as  a  cooking  vessel.  Thus 
the  clay  would  be  at  once  shaped  and  burned,  and 
ere  long  men  would  find  that,  shaped  and  burned, 
it    needed    no    other   support   than    that   of  its    own 

'  Cato,  7^6'  Kc  Rust.,  xxv.,  'dolia  picaln.'  See  also  P.  K.T. 
Aemiliani,  De  Ke  Rust.,  x.  i,  and  G.  I^anii,  Lezioni,  p.  438,  for 
pots  of  this  kind  found  at  Artiniino  near  Siyna. 


Boats  and  Boatmen  189 

strength.  In  such  a  discovery  pottery  would  be  born 
at  once,  in  a  progress  which  led  easily  from  the  natural 
form  of  the  gourd  to  its  unstudied  reproduction  in 
the  clay  applied  to  protect  it,  and  from  the  resultant 
clay  vessel,  burnt  but  still  porous,  to  the  pot  resistant 
within,  because  lined  with  glaze  that  imitated  exactly 
the  pitch  applied  to  the  gourd.  It  is  easy  to  see 
that  this  latter  loan  accepted  by  the  potter  from  the 
fisher  is  indirectly  an  argument  for  the  former,  and 
goes  far  to  establish  the  theory  which  makes  the 
gourd  the  original,  in  its  shape  and  weakness  together, 
of  the  whole  art  of  moulding  and  burning  clay. 

But  if  so,  what  shall  we  say  of  the  fisherman's  gourd 
still  shaped,  lined,  and  used  at  Florence?  The  man 
himself  is  a  survival  of  the  earliest  human  life  by  the 
Arno  ;  he  still  gets  his  food  to-day  as  his  ancestors 
got  it  who  first  settled  here.  If  proof  of  this  were 
needed  one  has  only  to  look  again  at  what  he  carries 
at  his  waist.  The  oldest  trace  of  human  occupation 
on  this  site  has  been  found  in  the  prehistoric  graves 
of  the  Centre  with  their  unglazed  pots  filled  with  the 
ashes  of  the  dead.  But  the  fisherman  is  older  than 
the  potter,  and  the  fisherman's  gourd  is  a  present  fact, 
renewed  every  year,  as  if  to  assure  his  precedence. 
The  gourd,  then,  has  carried  down  to  the  present  day 
in  an  unbroken  succession  and  practice  that  earlier 
art  which  uses  nature  without  discarding  it,  and  of 
which  the  earliest  ceramic  was  but  a  derivative  and 
an  imitation. 


CHAPTER    IX 

THE    RIVER   TRADE 

The  sand-trade  and  the  fishing  still  carried  on  at 
Florence  are  only  the  poor  remains  of  a  river  life  once 
much  fuller  and  more  important.  There  is  a  back- 
ground here  which  it  is  well  to  remember  ;  thinking, 
as  one  sees  the  boats  still  moving  on  the  stream,  of 
what  that  movement  once  meant  to  the  city  ;  how  it 
linked  her  with  Pisa  and  the  sea,  and  how  Florence 
was  great  very  much  because  of  her  place  on  this  open 
water-way . 

The  matter  does  not  lie  altogether  beyond  the 
memory  of  living  men.  I  heard  of  a  case  in  which 
the  furniture  of  an  English  family  moving  from 
Leghorn  to  Florence,  as  late  as  1863,  was  brought 
up  all  the  way  by  water  in  a  barge  to  the  old  city 
port  at  the  Pignone.  There,  indeed,  a  basin  and 
shelter  had  long  been  contrived  for  the  '  gondolas ' 
of  the  Grand  Duke — you  may  still  see  the  plans  of 
it  in  the   Archivio^ — and  thence  the  Court  used  to 

'  Firenze,  Arch,  di  Stalo,  C.ipitani  di  Parte,  Indice  dclle  I'iante, 
No.  xiv.  21,  '  Arsenale  delle  Gondole  al  Pignone.' 


The  River  Trade  193 

drop  down-stream  in  these  state  barges  on  their  way 
to  a  villeggiatura  at  the  Ambrogiana  of  Montelupo, 
or  some  other  country  resort.  If  you  would  add  to 
the  impression,  and  know  what  serious  use  was  made 
of  the  river  in  the  sixteenth  century,  go  to  the  Piazza 
of  Santa  Trinita,  and  measure  the  great  column  of 
Justice  that  stands  in  front  of  the  Church.  This 
mighty  shaft  of  granite,  once  part  of  the  Baths  of 
Caracalla,  was  a  gift  of  Pius  iv.  to  Cosimo  I.,  and 
came  all  the  way  by  water  from  Rome  to  Signa. 
The  journey  might  have  been  completed  in  the  same 
way  had  the  season  not  been  summer  :  a  trial  to  the 
patience  of  the  Grand  Duke  and  of  his  architect 
Vasari,  who  chose  to  have  the  monument  dragged 
by  road  these  last  eight  miles  to  Florence  rather  than 
wait  for  the  rains  and  the  rising  river.  Such  was  the 
capacity  of  the  Arno  and  the  use  made  of  it  in  1 562.^ 
The  further  we  pursue  this  matter  of  navigation 
in  the  Val  d'Arno  the  more  important  does  it 
appear,  alike  in  the  money  spent  on  it  and  the 
men  of  genius  whose  attention  it  attracted  and 
whose  invention  it  stimulated.  Leonardo  da  Vinci 
himself  plans  a  new  water-way  here,^  and  leaves 
designs  which  men  study  with  fresh  interest  to-day, 
in  the  hope  of  recovering  something  of  that  old 
prosperity  which  came  with  the  command  of  the 
river.     Already,  in    1463,  Florence  had  dredged  the 

^  Gaye,  Cartcggio,  iii.  pp.  6i,  62. 

-  See  citations  \\\  Boll.  Soc.  Geogr.  Ital.,  1905,  p.  90,^,  etc. 

N 


194 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


bar  below  Pisa  that  her  galleys  might  pass  freely 
to  and  from  the  sea.^  Earlier  still,  in  1422,  Brunel- 
lesco,  busy  as  he  was  in  designing  his  Dome,  found 
time  to  win  a  prize  for  a  new  barca,  or  iiaviglio,  fit 
to  carry  cargo  at  a  cheap  rate  by  water     The  city 


ANCIENT    MILL   ON    THE   ARNO   AT    ROVEZZANO 

bought   his    rights   in    this    invention,    meaning    no 
doubt  to  use  it  on  the  Arno." 

It  would  seem  as  if  the  architect  of  the  Dome, 
when  he  designed  his  boat,  might  have  been  think- 
ing of  how  best  to  bring  home  the  material  for 
that  imperishable  monument.  However  this  may 
have    been,    it    is   certain    that    the    building    he    so 


'  Gaye,  Carteggio,  i.  565. 


-  Ibid.,  i.  547. 


The  River  Trade  195 

magically  crowned  might  itself  have  set  his  mind  at 
work  on  just  such  a  plan.  In  the  thirteenth  century 
the  growing  prosperity  of  Florence  and  especially  of 
her  principal  manufacture  had  brought  about  the 
building  of  many  mills  and  weirs  on  the  river  with 
some  clanger  to  the  freedom  of  the  ancient  water-way. 
In  1 33 1  and  successive  years  legislation  limited  these, 
obliging  the  owners  to  provide  a  passage  for  the  river 
trade.^  The  Cathedral  was  then  being  built,  and 
the  law  that  secured  this  new  liberty  had  its  chief 
justification  in  the  traffic  that  presently  brought  the 
marbles  of  Carrara  by  the  Arno,  and  the  serpentine 
of  Prato  by  the  Bisenzio,  to  shine  where  they  stand 
to-day,  as  the  applied  decoration  of  Church  and 
Campanile  alike. 

Further  still  ;  the  dim  days  of  the  earlier  middle 
age  show  us  the  barbarians  leaving  their  mark  here. 
Once,  in  825,  it  is  the  Normans  who  come  to  sack 
the  Badia  at  San  Domenico,  pushing  their  '  long 
ships'  up  the  river  as  far  as  Florence;-  again,  still 
earlier,  and  in  a  wise  favour,  it  is  the  great  Theodoric, 
King  of  the  Goths,  who  in  the  fifth  centur\-  directs 
the  removal  of  obstacles  to  the  river  traffic  :  ^  the  very 
legislation  which  Florence  herself  re-enacted  in  the 
fourteenth  century.      If  we  are  to  think  of  the  circum- 

'  Repelti,  Diz.  della  Toscaim,  i.  p.  146. 

^  R.  DavicLsohn,  Storia  di  Firenze  (Firenze:  Sansoni,  1907),  vol.  i. 
p.  120. 

■*  Cassiodorus,  Vai-iae,  v.  17,  20;  Aloit.  Germ.  Scriptores,  xii. 
I54-5- 


196  Florence  Past  and  Present 

stances  as  similar,  this  Gothic  law  would  sa}-  much 
for  the  importance  of  the  Arno  trade  in  Gothic  days. 
That  it  was  of  consequence  under  the  Romans 
is  plain  from  the  fact  that  a  Roman  inscription 
acquaints  us  with  the  office  of  the  '  Curator 
Kalendarii  Florentinorum '  at  Pisa,  showing  that 
Florence  had  invested  money  there,  and  needed 
one  to  take  charge  of  the  payment  of  interest  on 
the  Kalends  of  each  month. ^  It  is  a  fair  inference 
that  this  connection  between  the  two  towns  de- 
pended ultimatel}'  on  the  river  that  united  them, 
and  that  the  Arno  traffic  was  then  considerable 
indeed. 

It  is  difficult  to  believe  that  the  physical  relation 
of  the  Val  d'Arno  to  the  Val  di  Chiana  had  not  a 
commercial  consequence ;  the  trade  of  the  latter 
helping  to  keep  the  former  busy.  Now  in  early 
times  the  Chiana  traffic  was  ver)-  considerable ; 
Strabo  assures  us  of  its  importance,"-  which  appears 
beyond  question  in  the  ancient  prosperity  of  Cortona 
and  Chiusi,  the  chief  cities  of  this  valley.  Pliny 
sa\'s  the  Chiana  was  navigable  in  his  da\','^  and  how 
long  this  water-wa\-  remained  open,  and  what  interest 
Florence  still  had  in  it,  may  be  read  in  the  record 
that  tells  us  how,  as  late  as  1390.  the  city  paid 
for  two  "  shii)s "  to  sail  here  for  the  defence  of 
Montepulciano.^      The    matter    seems    summed     up 

1  C.I.L.,  xi.  I  ;   1444-  -'  ^^  220,  235.  ■'  N.H.,  iii.  5. 

^  Gaye,  op.  cii.,  i.  534. 


The  River  Trade  197 

significantly  enough  in  the  singular  custom  by 
which,  as  late  as  the  fifteenth  century  A.D.,  the 
chief  magistrate  of  the  latter  town,  like  another 
Doge,  yearly  took  barge  on  her  lake  with  heralds 
and  notaries  to  wed  these  waters  with  a  ring.^ 
Now  in  realit)-  the  husband  here  was  the  Tiber, 
'  quamlibet  magnarum  navium  ex  Italo  mari  capax  ' 
as  Pliny  calls  it,"'  and  the  bride  the  Arno,  in  whose 
western  course  to  the  same  sea  the  traffic  circle 
was  complete.  It  is  interesting  to  notice  that  the 
last  proposal  to  revive  the  Arno  and  the  river  trade 
of  Tuscany  provides  for  a  great  reservoir  near  Arezzo, 
and  for  a  passage  thence  b\-  the  Chiana  and  Chiusi 
to  the  Tiber.  Thus  the  Arno  would  again  find 
its  place  in  a  commercial  water-system  which  the 
ancient  world  knew  well,  and  which  brought  no 
little  prosperit}'  to  Florence. 

This  then  is  the  great  past,  so  poorly  represented 
to-day  by  the  boats  one  sees  at  Florence  ;  cargo-boats 
no  longer  ;  busy  onh^  in  bringing  their  petty  gains  of 
sand  to  shore,  their  poor  fish  to  the  humbler  market  of 
the  city.  The  reason  of  such  decline  ma\-  lie  parti}' 
in  the  river  itself,  for,  with  the  felling  of  the  \^al 
d'Arno  forests,  the  rainfall  is  lessened,  and  w  hat  the 
clouds  still  give  runs  aw  a\'  sooner,  so  that  in  spite  of 
floods  the  mean  level  of  the  Arno  must  be  U^wer  than 
it  once  was.  But  in  truth,  as  dates  show,  it  is  the 
coming  of  the  railwa\-,  laid  almost  parallel  with  the 

^  Repetti,  Diz.  della  Joscana,  i.  719.  -  A'.H.,  loc.  cit. 


198  Florence  Past  and  Present 

river  from  Florence — nay  from  Arezzo — to  the  sea, 
that  has  chiefl}-  brought  the  change.  With  the 
appearance  of  the  new  means  of  transport  came  a 
natural  carelessness  of  the  old,  in  which  the  towing 
paths  were  neglected  and  allowed  to  fall  into  the 
stream,  and  the  great  weir  of  Castelfranco,  ro}'ally 
built  by  the  Medici  in  the  sixteenth  century,  was 
sold,  in  1875,  to  a  private  owner,  with  the  result  that 
it  now  lies  in  disrepair,  and  offers  a  serious  danger 
to  the  boats  that  would  pass  up  or  down  b}-  its 
callone.  Still,  in  spite  of  all  difficulty  they  pass,  and 
we  have  only  to  descend  the  Arno  to  find  even  now, 
though  in  diminished  measure,  the  river  trade  still 
moving  which  once  reached  Florence  and  contributed 
so  much  to  her  prosperit\\ 

The  Mugnone  now  falls  into  the  Arno  much  lower 
than  it  formerly  did,  reaching  the  greater  stream  onh' 
at  the  western  end  of  the  Cascine  :  a  change  which 
may  be  reckoned  with  the  rest  as  one  of  the  causes 
why  commerce  no  longer  comes  to  Florence  by  water. 
Pass  this  confluence,  however  ;  pass  the  shallow  of 
Marcignana,  which  the  alkuium  brought  down  b}- 
the  Mugnone  has  formed,  and  the  river  begins  at 
once  to  show  what  it  can  do  still,  in  the  manner,  if 
not  the  measure,  of  the  greater  {)ast.  At  Ugnano, 
scarcely  a  mile  below  the  Cascine,  a  true  cargo-boat, 
though  of  small  size,  lay  waiting  its  load  in  the  winter 
of  1909  ;  I  suppose  this  is  now  the  highest  point 
reached    by   the    existing    river    trade.     Such    boats, 


The  River  Trade  201 

however,  you  will  find  in  growing  number  as  you 
follow  the  growing  river  ;  at  Signa,  where  it  has 
already  received  the  Bisenzio  ;  at  the  Golfolina,  where 
the  Ombrone  falls  in,  and,  definitely,  at  Montelupo, 
where  the  Pesa  joins  the  Arno,  and  where  manu- 
factures of  earthenware  and  glass  are  set  b}-  the 
stream  and  use  it  as  a  means  of  transport.  Empoli 
sees  the  confluence  of  Arno  and  Elsa,  and  its  match 
factories  bring  custom  to  the  growing  trade.  It  is 
not  difficult  to  understand  that,  if  the  river  is  to 
compete  with  its  rival  the  rail,  its  advantage  will  lie 
here  ;  in  the  transport  of  fragile  things  like  pottery 
and  glass,  or  combustibles  like  sulphur  and  hicifcrs, 
on  which  the  railway  levies  high  charges  for  so 
dangerous  a  freight.  Another  adxantage  appears  at 
Calcinaia,  between  Pontedera  and  Pisa,  in  the  canal 
which  runs  directh'  from  this  point  in  the  river  to 
Leghorn,  offering  a  shorter  route  thither  than  the  rail 
can  show.  Calcinaia  is  therefore  a  prosperous  place, 
and  here,  or  at  the  neighbouring  Fornacette,  you  may 
see  for  the  first  time  the  realh-  heav}-  boats  of  the 
lower  Arno  ;  built  to  carr)^  bricks  or  grain  to  Leghorn, 
and  to  return  with  loads  of  coal  for  the  kiln,  or 
sulphate  of  copper  for  the  vineyards.  This  canal  is 
called  the  Fosso  del  Arnaccio,  as  if  the  river  itself 
once  followed  the  ver\'  route  the  canal  keeps  to-day. 
Strabo  in  fact  speaks  of  the  Arno  as  '  threefold  '  ; 
hinting  at  a  considerable  delta  towards  the  mouth, 
and  thus  it  may  well  be  that  the  present  traffic  by 


202  Florence  Past  and  Present 

water  is  not  merely  a  survival  of  the  past,  but  that, 
in  a  singular  persistence,  it  still  keeps  the  ancient 
line  of  passage,  a  branch  of  the  river  once  followed 
across  the  Pisan  plain.  Not  that  the  same  boats 
may  not  be  found  at  Pisa  too,  lying  in  the  Medicean 
port  with  its  great  sluice  and  roof,  or  crowding  the 
canal  of  the  Naviglio  for  which  that  port  was  built 
in  1603.  They  are  of  precisely  the  type  we  have 
already  studied  at  Florence,  with  a  rather  exagger- 
ated sheer  fore  and  aft,  which,  in  the  stern,  leaves 
room  for  a  great  earthen  water-jar  under  the  curve 
of  the  tiller.  The  chief  difference  is  in  the  size  of 
the  boat,  for  these  of  the  lower  Arno  may  run  to 
twenty-five  or  even  thirty  tons  as  against  two  or 
three  at  Florence. 

How  essentiall)'  of  the  Arno  this  trade  and 
navigation  are  is  proved  by  the  site  of  the  yards  and 
slips  where  the  boats  are  built.  You  would  expect 
to  find  these  building  places  at  Pisa  or  Leghorn,  or 
at  least  on  the  lower  reaches  of  the  river,  but  it  is  not 
so.  Light  boats  are  still  occasionally  built  at  Florence 
itself,  and  from  Florence  but  a  short  journe)-  down- 
stream will  bring  )'ou  to  the  seat  of  this  industr\\  It 
is  a  trip  worth  taking.  The  whole  matter  is  both 
singular  and  suggestive,  and  is  so  little  known  that, 
even  in  Tuscany,  few  are  aware  of  its  existence  and 
importance,  or  could  tell  you  where  to  go  to  find  an 
Arno  boat  in  building.  The  place  is  Limitc,  so 
called     as    markmg:    the    convergence    of    tiic    three 


The  River  Trade  205 

ancient  dioceses  of  Florence,  Lucca,  and  Pistoia.  It 
lies  on  the  right  bank  of  the  Arno  between  Empoli 
and  Montelupo  ;  in  the  very  centre  therefore  of  the 
manufactures  which,  above  and  below,  begin  to  bring 
trade  to  the  growing  stream. 

A  post-carriage  runs  regularly  to  Limite  from 
Empoli,  but  the  pleasanter  way  of  reaching  it  is  by 
walking  there  from  Montelupo.  You  pass  first,  at 
the  west  end  of  this  town,  the  great  Villa  of  the 
Ambrogiana,  now  an  as)'lum  for  criminal  lunatics, 
and  so  find  the  river  at  Fibbiana.  Here  you  will 
notice  a  large  factory  where  wine-flasks  are  made, 
close  beside  the  picturesque  tower  of  the  Frescobaldi 
— the  '  Torre-Lunga '  as  it  is  called.  Hence  the 
path  leads  down-stream  along  the  river  embankment, 
and  below,  on  the  right,  you  will  see  long  plantations 
of  the  giant  reed,  the  canna,  that  lends  its  leaves  for 
the  wrapping  of  the  flasks  that  Fibbiana  turns  out. 
The  women  do  the  work  of  covering,  and  this 
industry  is  as  characteristic  of  the  lower  Val  d'Arno 
as  is  the  straw-plaiting  you  may  see  in  the  countr}^ 
round  Florence.  The  reed -beds  lie  between  the 
embankment  and  the  river  on  ground  periodically 
flooded  by  the  Arno,  for  the  canna  is  a  plant  which 
needs  wet  soil  if  it  is  to  live  and  reach  the  perfection 
it  shows  here.  So  you  reach  Limite,  passing  from 
the  left  to  the  right  bank  of  the  Arno  by  a  ferry, 
which,  as  you  cross,  makes  you  aware  of  the  deep 
pool    in    the    river   here.     This    convenience  has   no 


2o6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

doubt  fixed  the  site  of  the  village  and  its  industry, 
for  to  the  pool  the  slips  of  the  building-yards  all  lead 
down,  as  there  is  plent)'  of  water  here  even  in  the 
droughts  of  summer.  Floating  craft  of  all  sizes  lie 
anchored  b\'  the  banks,  and  as  you  land  and  enter 
Limite  itself,  skeleton  boats,  and  builders  that  move 
about  their  work,  betray  the  occupation  of  the  place. 

There  is  a  singularity  in  the  scene  that  stimulates 
curiosity.  Here  we  have  a  village — or  town  rather, 
for  it  holds  some  two  thousand  inhabitants — lying 
fifty  miles  from  the  sea,  _\'et  building  not  only  the 
lighter  and  heax'ier  craft  that  still  ply  on  the  Arno 
but  sea-going  vessels  as  well,  and  these  in  some 
number  and  size.  When  built  they  pass  to  the 
Mediterranean  clown  the  river,  and  the  fact  that  this 
water-way  still  bears  them  to-day  is  enough  to  show, 
and  even  to  set  in  a  new  light,  the  existing  possi- 
bilities of  this  neglected  stream.  The  details  of 
the  industry  when  examined  only  confirm  the  first 
impression,  which  may  well  be  one  of  surprise. 

The  principal  )'ard  at  Limite,  which  ma)'  serve  as  an 
example  of  the  rest,  belongs  to  the  Fratelli  Picchiotti, 
representatives  of  a  family  which  has  built  boats 
here  for  at  least  three  centuries.  A  hundred  men 
find  regular  employment  in  this  \-ard,  some  of  them 
veterans  of  fifty  or  sixty  \'ears'  experience  of  the 
craft.  The  boats  they  build  for  the  river  are  just 
those  we  have  already  described  in  detail.  For  such 
no    drawings    are    needed  ;    the    type    is    fixed     by 


The  River  Trade  211 

tradition.  '  They  will  not  have  it  clianged,'  sa}-  the 
Picchiotti  of  their  customers  the  Arno  boatmen,  \\'ho 
are  wise  in  a  conservatism  which  the  ages  have 
taught;  the  temper  of  mind  which,  having  found 
what  is  reall\-  needed  here,  is  determined  to  abide 
by  it.  The  }ard  obe)'s,  in  a  traditional  and  corre- 
spondent knowledge  of  the  old  tccluiiquc ;  hears  the 
order,  and  turns  out  by  rule  of  thumb  a  boat  of  the 
tonnage  required.  These  river  craft  are  built  with 
ribs  and  understrakes  of  oak,  for  the  Paduli  of 
Fucecchio,  which  }M'eld  the  best  quality  of  this 
timber,  are  not  far  off.  The  rest  of  the  boat  is  apt 
to  be  of  pine,  and  the  price  ma}'  run  as  high  as  ^120 
for  one  carrying  25  tons.  Those  sent  to  Florence 
are  much  cheaper  than  the  boats  that  go  down- 
stream ;  costing  from  £\2  to  ^16  apiece. 

In  the  two  hundred  )'ears  from  1600  to  iSoo  the 
books  of  the  Picchiotti  show  that  the  ward  worked 
for  the  river  alone,  turning  out  in  that  time  about 
three  hundred  Arno  craft,  greater  and  smaller.^  Only 
in  the  last  century  did  they  begin  to  build  for  the 
sea,  but  the  record  runs  that  from  1805  onwards  they 
launched  about  two  hundred  ships  —  bilanccllc, 
tartane,  and  even  brigantiiii ;  the  least  measuring 
20,  and  the  largest  450  tons.  Of  late,  the  firm 
has   secured  several   Government  contracts,  and  has 

^  See  Rclazioiie  alia  Giuria  Jell'  Espos.  Inteniaz.  di  Alilaiio,  San 
Casciano,  Stianti,  1906.  For  the  communication  of  this  publication, 
and  for  much  courtesy,  I  am  indebted  to  the  Fratelli  Picchiotti. 


2  1 2  Florence  Past  and  Present 

supplied  the  Italian  Navy  with  two  wooden  torpedo 
boats,  besides  executing  smaller  orders.  One  of  its 
last  feats  was  the  launching  of  a  yacht  with  a  motor- 
engine  of  a  hundred  horse-power  for  a  private 
customer.  The  larger  work  at  Limite  is  all  in  the 
hands  of  the  Picchiotti,  but  theirs  is  b}-  no  means  the 
only  yard,  and  the  )'early  tonnage  the  place  turns  out 
must  be  considerable  indeed,  when  a  single  firm  is 
able  to  show  such  a  record. 

The  Picchiotti  have  a  curious  family  tradition 
which  is  worth  reporting  here.  The  name  commonly 
given  on  the  river  to  an  Arno  boat  is  bccolino,  which, 
the  Picchiotti  sa}',  comes  from  that  of  an  ancestor 
of  theirs,  a  certain  Domenico  or  Bcco,  who,  accord- 
ing to  the  story,  first  invented  the  peculiar  design  of 
these  river  craft.  To  speak  frankly,  I  do  not  believe 
the  tale,  and  for  the  following  reason.  The  word 
becoliiio  is  not  registered  in  Rigutini-P'anfani,^  but 
in  the  gergo — the  thieves'  cant  of  Italy — tlie  word 
beccola  occurs,  and  is  explained  to  mean  the  timber 
carried  down  by  river  floods.-  The  connection  here 
is  obvious,  and  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  \.\\q.  gcrgo 
— often  very  valuable  philologically — here  presents 
the  root  of  the  matter.  Bcccoliiio,  as  the  derivative 
from  beccola,  would  be  properly  so  spelt,  and  the 
form  bccoliiio  would  thus  appear  as  the  result  of  the 
story   just  reported,  and    of  the    false   etymology  on 

'    Vocalwlario  Italiano  della  Lingua  Parlala,  Fiienze,  Barbera. 
-  Mirabella,  Mala  Vita  (Napoli :  Perella,  1910),  p.  299. 


The  River  Trade  213 

which  the  tale  depends.  Etymology  and  tale  alike 
would  arise  on  the  disappearance  of  the  word 
beccola  from  ordinary  language,  nor  would  this  be 
the  first  time  that  a  lost  word  has  been  found  again  in 
\}i\Q  gergo.  Trivial  in  itself,  this  matter  has  its  own 
importance  as  holding  a  suggestion  full  of  conse- 
quence for  the  history  of  the  Arno  boat  and  of  the 
industry  that  produces  it. 

The  Arno  in  its  great  days  was  famous  for  just 
this  beccola — if  one  may  borrow  the  slang  word — the 
trees  it  had  uprooted  in  its  high  valley  and  brought 
down  singly,  or  in  masses,  when  it  rose  in  flood. 
Leonardo  da  Vinci  says  of  the  Golfolina,  in  study- 
ing the  problem  of  the  river  navigation,  '  it  opens 
no  free  passage,  as  the  channel  is  apt  to  be  choked 
by  trees,'  and  it  is  well  known  that  the  ruin  of  the 
Ponte  Vecchio  in  the  great  flood  of  1333  was  due  to 
the  timber  the  river  then  brought  down.  One  might 
quote  Fancelli  also  to  the  same  purpose,  were  it 
necessary  to  multiply  testimony  in  support  of  a  point 
so  plain.  Rather  is  it  worth  while  to  notice  that 
this  river  action  had  an  important  consequence  for 
man  ;  it  suggested  to  him  the  artificial  building  of 
floating  wood  into  rafts,  and  thus  lay  behind  all  the 
consequences  of  that  once  novel  operation.  The 
matter  comes  about  as  naturally  indeed  as  any  other 
great  discovery.  Flood-borne  trees  are  like  the  rough 
hairs  that  unite  to  form  felt ;  their  branches  easily 
lock  together  as  the   stream   brings  them  into  con- 


2  14  Florence  Past  and  Present 

tact,  and  they  thus  float  d<nvn,  no  longer  singly,  but 
in  pairs  and  masses.  As  the  case  of  the  Golfolina 
shows,  the  river  gorge  is  aboxe  all  the  place  where 
trees  tend  thus  to  group  themselves  as  they  float, 
and  the  gorge  again  appears,  then,  as  a  place  where 
the  river  power  acts  on  man  and  raises  his  spirit  and 
state.  It  was  here,  one  remembers,  that  the  fisher- 
man joined  the  hunter  in  his  new  enterprise  of  trade, 
but,  earlier  still,  it  was  here  that  the  matted  trees 
the  river  assembled  taught  man  to  commence  raft 
building  on  his  own  account,  and  to  use  the  stream 
for  the  deliberate  and  profitable  transport  of  timber. 

When  the  great,  though  simple,  discover}-  was 
made  we  shall  never  know,  nor  is  it  necessarj' ;  more 
or  less,  the  transport  of  wood  in  rafts  has  occupied 
the  Arno  ever  since  man  came  to  this  valley,  and  it 
is  only  in  our  own  times  that  the  river  has  ceased  to 
carr\-  timber.  Men  are  still  living  at  h'lorence  who, 
in  their  strength,  took  an  active  part  in  this  traffic, 
and  from  their  memories  it  is  possible  to  recover 
something  of  the  last  days  of  the  Arno  raft,  and  of 
a  life  and  trade  which  i)erpetuates  its  name  in  that 
of  the  Piazza  delle  Travi,^  while  its  commencement 
lies  be\-ond  the  beginnings  of  historx . 

If  you  are  given  to  that  waterside  idling  which 
R.  L.   Stevenson  found    so    rich    and    rewarding   an 

'  TIrtc  was  also  a  gale  in  the  livcr  wall  here  called  the  porticcUa  dt 
fodari,  the  poslern  of  the  rafts.  See  Ciaye,  CarU'ggio,  i.  ji.  510  ad 
annum  1358. 


The  River  Trade  215 

occupation,  patience,  combined  with  dul)-  directed 
curiosity,  may  bring  \'ou  to  speech  with  one  of  these 
men.  This  has  been  my  good  fortune,  and  what  I 
learned  shah  here  be  set  down  as  a  curious  rehc  of 
the  past.  But  first  I  must  keep  faith  with  my 
informants.  They  are  jealous  of  the  traditions  of 
their  craft,  and  what  I  heard  was  told  me  under 
pledge  of  a  promised  record  in  this  book.  To 
perform  my  promise  to  the  letter  I  begin  with  what 
is  of  little  c(insequence  for  our  purpose,  a  roll  of  the 
chief  names  heard  on  the  Arno  these  last  hundred 
years  ;  the  muster-roll  of  the  dead  raftsmen  called 
for  the  last  time  by  the  few  who  still  know  and 
survive.  Hear  then  and  note  that  in  the  past 
century  the  chief  of  the  craft  were  Beco,  il  Vecchio, 
Pirole,  Morino,  Stefano,  Giacomino,  Drea  and  Brogio, 
all  of  Rignano  ;  while  to  the  Casentino  belonged  the 
family  of  the  Pignotti ;  Giovacchino,  Luigi,  Giuseppe 
and  Giovanni,  with  Leopoldo  son  of  Giovanni,  and 
Oreste  and  Grisanti  sons  of  Giuseppe,  all  strong  men 
and  famous  in  their  day,  skilled  in  the  building  and 
guiding  of  rafts  on  the  river,  which  is  not  by  any 
means  the  simple  matter  it  might  seem.  What 
it  meant  and  was — this  craft  and  life  of  the  river 
raftsmen — these  ancients  rather  know  than  tell :  here 
are  my  gatherings  from  their  unstudied  speech. 

The  principal  forest  from  which  these  men  drew 
their  material  lay  about  Camaldoli,  and  was 
skilfully   administered    by    the    monks  of   the    great 


2i6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

House  it  surrounded  and  sheltered  in  the  Apennine 
of  Stia  and  Pratovecchio.  The  word  secular^  often 
loosely  used  of  any  trees  beyond  a  certain  age  and 
size,  had  here  its  strict  and  proper  application. 
Felling  was  done  in  the  grand  manner,  and  was 
ordered  by  epochs  of  a  hundred  }'ears.  Planting 
followed  the  same  rule,  so  that  giant  beeches  and 
pines  at  least  a  century  old  were  never  wanting,  ever 
falling,  under  the  axes  of  the  men  of  Moggiona  who 
served  the  Abbe\^  as  foresters  from  generation  to 
generation.^  The  same  hands  built  the  wood  on 
sledges  which  white  oxen  drew  down  forest  paths 
and  rough  hill  roads  to  the  river  at  Pratovecchio. 

Here  the  raftsmen  took  up  their  work.  The  unit 
of  the  river  train  was  \\\^fodero,  or  raft  built  of  pine- 
trees  in  the  round,  fit  for  ships'  masts  or  yards,  or 
composed  of  squared  timber  trimmed  from  the 
larger  hard-wood.  Much  skill  went  to  the  building. 
Only  the  f ode  r a  tore  who  had  known  the  upper  Arno 
from  boyhood,  and  inherited  his  craft  from  his 
ancestors,  could  tell  just  how  the  work  should  be 
done  ;  how  much  wood,  and  no  more,  he  could  safely 
steer  over  the  Arno  shallows  ;  how  the  fodcro  should 
be  built  so  as  to  float  clear  in  the  frequent  narrows 
and  safely  turn  the  sharp  corners  of  the  rock-girt 
stream.  The  work  of  building  was  complicated  by 
the  fact  that,  to  save  men  and  labour,  the  fodero  did 
not      float    down-stream     alone,    but      travelled     in 

^  See  Kepetti,  op.  cit.,  iii.  pp.  242-3. 


The  River  Trade  217 

company  of  its  kind  ;  three  or  {our  foderi  wqvq  joined 
to  each  other  by  chains,  just  as  waggons  are  coupled 
together  on  the  raihvay.  This  train  of  rafts  was 
called  the  madiata}  and  might  consist,  say,  of  two 
or  three  foderi  of  beams,  followed  by  one  or  two 
others  each  made  up  of  ten  or  twelve  pine-trees  in 
the  round.  The  arrangement,  one  sees,  suited  the 
conditions  of  water  transport  on  a  river  like  the  Arno, 
often  narrow  enough,  and  apt  to  turn  awkward 
corners,  especially  in  its  higher  course.  Such 
difficulties  were  what  the /oderatore  kept  in  mind  as 
he  built,  conscious  that  a  pound  overweight  would 
mean  the  stranding  of  his  raft  on  some  river  bar, 
or  an  inch  of  excess  in  beam  its  ruin  at  the  narrows. 
He  worked  as  a  skilled  craftsman  then,  and  solved 
the  problem  as  we  have  seen,  dividing  the  long 
niadiata  into  a  number  of  distinct  yet  united  foderi 
that  it  might  be  at  once  light,  narrow,  and  flexible, 
while  still  carrying  a  large  measure  of  wood  to  the  sea. 
The  Camaldoli  timber  was  dressed  and  built  at 
Pratovecchio,  the  starting  point  of  the  inadiatc  in 
their  long  journe}'.  Three  days  brought  them 
thence  to  Florence,  and  in  as  many  more  the)' 
reached  Leghorn  ;  some  of  the  chief  halting  places 
on  the  river  route  being  Rignano,  San  Romano,  and 
Pisa.        But    all    the    wood     did     not     come    from 


■*  The  root  »iad  is  a  frequent  element  in  Italian  words  that  name 
articles  made  of  wood.  We  have  met  it  already  in  the  niadile  of  the 
boat-rib,  and  may  remember  the  Latin  materia. 


2  1 8  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Camaldoli ;  Vallombrosa  too  sent  its  supplies,  and 
a  still  more  notable  forest  was  that  of  Vallombrosa's 
daughter  House,  the  Badia  of  Montepiano  in 
the  Apennine  of  Vernio  above  Prato.  Here  the 
Bisenzio  was  pressed  into  service,  and  carried  the 
timber  to  Signa,  where  it  found  the  full  current  of 
the  Arno  ready  to  bear  it  down  with  the  rest. 

As  one  listens  to  \\\q.  fodcratorc,  it  is  not  so  much 

the  art  of  his  raft  building  as  the  skill  and  bravura 

of  his  wild  voyage  and  adventure  down-stream  that 

seem   characteristic  of  the  trade.     The  madiata  was 

managed  on  the  water  with  long  poles  or  sweeps,  one 

worked  from  the  bows  of  the  leading /cic/^r^,  the  other 

acting  as  a  helm  from  the  last.    The  men  stood  naked, 

or   nearly   so,  to  their  work,  and  no  wonder,  for  at 

every  rapid,  and  chiefly  at  the  river-weirs,  the  stress 

on  the  coupling  chains  was  apt  to  become  a  parting 

strain,   when    men   and    logs   together   leapt  the  fall, 

lashing    the    pool    below    to    foam    in    a    fierce    and 

dangerous    confusion.       These    risks    and    accidents 

were    indeed    so    much    '  in    the  clay's   work '   of  the 

fodcratore  that  our  ancients  of  the  river,  reminiscent, 

will  jest  of  it  to-day  with  broken  laughter.    '  Che  bclla 

frullata,'  they  will  say,  as  if  tall  pines  dancing  on  end 

were  no  more  than   whisks,  and  the  deeps  of  brown 

Bisenzio   or   Arno   in    flood   only  the   chocolate   that 

foams  in  the  cup.      Vet  not  always  ;  their  dim  eyes 

will   look   far,  and  their  faces  harden  as  they  tell  you 

of  the  Bozzo  della  Botta,  where  the  Bisenzio  finds  its 


The  River  Trade  219 

way  down  the  rocks  below  Vernio,  and  they  will 
confess,  if  pressed  to  it,  that  none  of  their  craft  would 
ride  down  these  jaws  of  death  till  he  had  first  signed 
himself  with  the  river  water  ^  and  called  on  the  name 
of  San  Gorgone.  Hope  clearly  lay  in  the  appeal,  and 
the  rapids  held  more  than  the  risk  to  life  that 
prompted  it.  The  religious  feelings  of  the  Italian  are 
strongly  local  ;  who  can  doubt  that  the  fodcratori 
thought  of  these  clanger  points  as  the  place  watched 
for  them  by  the  protecting  power  ?  But  so  the  gorge 
again  asserts  its  importance,  and  Gorgone  appears  in 
his  true  light  as  the  genijis  loci,  with  a  '  San '  prefixed 
as  a  concession  to  altered  religious  circumstance. 
'  San  Gorgone  '  is  not  the  peculiar  protector  of  the 
raftsman  ;  it  was  from  a  renahiolo  and  fisher  I  first 
heard  of  him,  and  he  is  known  to  and  invoked  by  all 
of  the  river  craft.  '  San  Gorgone  ci  mandi  la  plena,' 
they  say  when  the  river  runs  low  ;  or  '  ci  tratta  male, 
San  Gorgone,'  when  they  are  waiting  for  the  rains 
and  a  fresh  supply  of  fish  and  sand.  This  '  Gorgon  ' 
is  the  river  spirit,  with  a  special  habitat  in  the  gorge.- 
Descending  from  unreckoned  time,  he  still  haunts 
the  old  shores,  and  still  lives  in  the  minds  of  those 
who  look  to  the  Arno  for  their  occupation. 

Once  fairly  in  the  main   stream  and  safely  below 

^  Cf.  Hesiod,  IVorks  and  Days,  737-41,  who  registers  tlie  precept 
that  hands  must  be  dipped  at  the  crossing  of  a  stream.  This  rite 
would  thus  generally  be  performed  at  the  gorge.      See  above,  p.  46. 

-  T-  C  Lawson,  Modern  Greek  Folk-Lore  (Cambridge,  lyio), 
pp.  1S9-90,  259. 


2  20  Florence  Past  and  Present 

the  Golfolina — not  without  a  fresh  appeal  to  the 
spirit  of  the  gorge — matters  went  more  smoothly 
for  the  raftsman.  Empoli,  it  seems,  was  the  place 
where  the  wood  was  measured  for  duty,  and  here  the 
fodcratori  did  their  best — generall}-  with  success — to 
come  to  an  understanding  with  the  Customs.  A 
hundred  of  wood  would  pass  as  sixty,  and,  if  let  off 
thus  easily,  the  men  would,  on  their  return,  bring  a 
present  of  coffee  and  sugar  to  the  complacent  officers. 
Leghorn,  as  we  have  said,  was  the  goal  of  the  wood 
trade,  and  in  those  days  that  city  was  a  free  port, 
where  all  goods  were  sold  as  it  were  in  bond,  and 
whence  they  might  with  a  little  address  be  smuggled 
out  of  the  gates  into  the  country. 

From  Pisa,  the  wood  often  travelled  to  Leghorn  by 
the  river  mouth  and  the  open  sea,  but  this  true, 
though  brief  voyage,  was  so  much  at  the  mercy  of  the 
weather  that  a  halt  was  often  called  at  Bocca  d'Arno, 
and  a  night  spent  on  the  beach  to  prepare  for  it. 
'  We  had  kindled  our  fires  of  driftwood  '■ — it  is  the 
old  raftsman  who  speaks — 'and  all  was  calm.  The 
men  sang  by  the  sea  as  they  smelt  their  supper  cook- 
ing, for  we  had  meat  that  night,  and  ^^■ine  and  bread 
in  plent)'.  Suddenly  the  wind  rose,  and  the  storm 
was  on  us,  with  rain  that  tjucnched  our  fires,  and 
waves  that  wet  us  to  the  skin  as  wc  struggled  to  save 
our  floating  wood.'  How  often,  one  wonders,  by 
Arno  mouth,  since  men  first  found  and  used  the  river, 
has  just  that  simple,  almost  savage,  scene  been  re- 


The  River  Trade  221 

peated  :  the  camp  on  the  beach,  the  supper,  the  song, 
the  storm,  the  '  rates  quassas '  ?  Here  are  words  of 
to-day  which  convincingly  relate  some  Florentines  at 
least  to  the  primitive  times  of  Italy  and  of  the  world. 
Old  and  broken,  the  last  foderatori  linger  still,  and 
may  still  be  found  in  humble  houses  by  the  river. 
Soon  they  must  go,  and  then  the  long  past  they 
represent  will  die  with  them,  as  the  woods  where  they 
worked  have  now  disappeared  from  the  Apennine. 
So  the  Florentine  proverb  '  come  i  foderi ;  senza 
ritorno ' — the  '  no  more,  Lochaber '  of  Tuscan}^ — 
will  find  its  fulfilment,  and  only  the  raftless  river  will 
remain  to  remind  men  of  the  great  days  of  the  wood- 
trade  here. 

The  river,  and,  one  may  add,  a  few  obscure 
records,  such  as  only  the  specialist  in  these  things 
remembers.  For  Strabo  in  his  geograph}-  mentions 
this  \\ood-trade,  and  tells  how  Rome  depended  for 
at  least  some  of  her  timber  on  what  the  Tuscan 
Arno  brought  to  the  sea.^  A  tombstone  found  at 
Antella  in  1586,  but  dating  from  Roman  days,  was 
raised  to  the  memor)-  of  a  wood  merchant  there. 
It  bears  the  figures  of  his  adze,  saw,  and  square  to 
tell  us  that  timber  was  sometimes  dressed  near 
Florence  before  it  was  bound  in  rafts  for  the  longer 
voyage.-  An  inscription  from  Fiesole  shows  that 
the  carpenter's  craft  was  early  organised  in  one  of 
the  guilds  of  that  city.  Last,  and  most  remarkable 
^  E.  2  C.I.L.,  xi.  I,  1620. 


222  Florence  Past  and  Present 

of  all  these  ancient  records,  is  the  stone  still  standing, 
and  in  part  legible  to-day  by  those  who  climb  to 
the  lower  gallery  of  the  Baptistery  at  Florence. 
This  slab  of  marble  forms  the  sculptured  parapet 
to  one  of  the  window  openings,  but,  seen  from 
within,  it  shows  a  mutilated  inscription  of  the  second 
century  A.D.,  which  speaks  of  the  guild  of  the  wood- 
merchants  at  Florence  as  then  associated  with  a  like 
corporation  at  Ostia.  So,  to-day,  through  the  FratelH 
Picchiotti,  Limite  has  a  trade  connection  with  another 
shipbuilding  yard  by  the  sea  at  Civita  Vecchia. 
Just  what  has  happened  in  these  eighteen  centuries 
is  thus  clearly  shown.  Contraction,  not  extinction, 
is  what  has  affected  the  trade  ;  such  contraction  as 
may  be  measured  by  the  miles  between  Ostia  and 
Civita  Vecchia  in  Latium,  and  in  Tuscany  between 
Florence  and  Limite.  The  Arno  is  flowing  still, 
and  still  carrying,  if  not  rafts,  boats  and  even  ships  ; 
which,  after  all,  are  only  rafts  in  a  higher  and  final 
development.  The  origin  of  the  boat,  however,  is 
a  matter  too  obscure,  and  at  the  same  time  too 
interesting,  to  be  dismissed  thus  in  a  simple  assertion. 
The  flood  that  brings  down  floating  timber  would 
seem  the  origin  of  the  whole  matter.  Impossible 
that  the  men  who  watch  from  the  bank  sliould  not 
come  to  attempt  the  salvage  of  w  hat  the  river  brings 
them  ;  equally  impossible  that  the  moment  can  be 
long  delayed  of  an  accident,  in  which  one  of  the 
waders  loses   footing,   pulled   out  !))•  the  log  he  has 


The  River  Trade  223 

grasped,  and,  in  the  same  fateful  instant,  finds  a  new 
power  :  that  of  the  wood  itself,  buoyant,  and  able  to 
support  his  weight.  Clinging  to  his  log,  he  struggles  ; 
for  he  is  still  afraid,  and  finds  he  can  direct  what  is 
supporting  him.  Some  trick  of  the  current,  combin- 
ing with  these  instinctive  efforts,  brings  him  to  land 
on  the  opposite  bank,  and  the  discovery  is  made : 
that  the  floating  tree  is  a  safe  means  of  crossing  the 
river. 

From  this  natural  float  to  the  dug-out  and  the 
canoe  the  progress  is  easy  and  must  have  been 
early  made.  The  passenger  from  bank  to  bank,  who 
strips  to  enter  the  water,  finds  it  convenient  that  the 
log  he  leans  on  in  swimming  should  have  a  hollow 
where  he  can  stow  his  clothes,  and  whatever  he 
carries,  to  keep  them  dr3\  He  burns  or  chips  the 
log  accordingly,  and,  b}'  burning  and  chipping  with 
fire  and  flint,  he  reaches  at  last  his  ideal,  the  craft 
that  is  long  enough  and  deep  enough  to  carr\^  a  man, 
or  even  a  party  and  their  goods,  upon  the  water 
without  putting  them  to  the  trouble  of  undressing 
or  of  swimming.  The  teacher  in  this  tccJiiiiqiic  was, 
obviously,  Vesta,  or,  as  the  Greeks  said,  Hestia,  the 
primitive  savage  hearth,  kindled  in  the  root  of  the 
white  oak,  and  burning  its  own  chimney  upwards 
in  the  trunk  of  the  tree  by  the  power  of  a  fire  ever 
smouldering  and  never  allowed  to  die  out.  In  a  new 
and  studied  application  of  fire,  art  now  gave  for 
the   standing   hollow  tree  a  canoe,  which   the  same 


2  24  Florence  Past  and  Present 

useful  element  had  prepared,  and  this  discovery,  one 
supposes,  brought  about  the  strange  ritual  of  May 
15th  at  Rome,  when  the  Pontifices  carried  rush  dolls 
to  the  Sublician  bridge,  and  the  Vestal  virgins  cast 
them  into  the  Tiber.^  For  these  dolls,  at  such  a 
date,  may  well  have  been  an  offering  to  the  spirit 
of  the  stream,  ever  eager  for  human  victims,  at  the 
opening  of  the  boating  season  ;  and  what  goddess 
had  more  right  to  be  represented  when  the  boat  was 
in  question  than  Vesta,  whose  fire  underla\-  the 
whole  craft  ?  As  for  Florence,  istia,  as  we  have 
seen,  is  still  the  Tuscan  name  for  the  tree  and  timber 
that  are  most  valued  and  employed  in  the  boat 
building  of  the  Arno  yards. 

Thus  the  canoe  and  the  process  of  preparing  it  ex- 
plain much,  yet  not  quite  all  we  want.  In  the  boat 
there  are  two  things  to  be  considered  ;  the  form,  and 
the  structure  by  which  that  form  is  attained.  If  one 
thinks  only  of  the  first  of  these,  then,  fine  as  the 
Arno  craft  are,  and  full  of  the  character  that  comes 
of  perfect  adaptation  to  the  end  they  are  meant  to 
serve,  the  canoe  may  well  have  been  the  model  from 
which  they  were  derived  ;  but  structure  is  another 
matter,  the  explanation  of  which  is  yet  to  seek. 
The  canoe  is  made  by  destruction — the  removal  of 
superfluous  wood — just  as  the  sculptor  finds  his 
statue  in  the  marble  by  force  of  chiselling  it  away. 
The  boat  on  the  other  hand  is  shaped  by  a  process 
1  See  Fowler,  Roman  Festivals  {luOnAon  :   Macmillan,  1899),  p.  112. 


The  River  Trade  225 

exactly  the  reverse  of  this  ;  it  grows  by  the  adding 
of  part  to  part  and  plank  to  plank.  It  is  easy  to 
see  that  the  first  boat-builder  had  a  canoe  in  mind, 
and  worked  to  reproduce  the  form  it  offered,  but 
whence  did  he  borrow  the  new  process  of  building 
he  used  to  attain  his  end  ? 

Now,  just  as  to  find  the  origin  of  the  canoe  we 
had  to  begin  with  the  floating  timber  of  the  river 
flood,  the  same  natural  fact,  viewed  as  the  starting 
point  of  another  progress,  will  give  the  element 
still  lacking  to  the  complete  explanation  of  the 
boat.  Trees  come  together  as  the  river  carries  them  ; 
men  learn  the  art  of  raft-building,  and  it  is  this  in  a 
new  application — used  to  realise  constructiveh'  the 
form  attained  otherwise  in  the  canoe — that  gives 
man  at  last  the  true  boat  ;  as  long  and  light  as  its 
model,  with  a  new  flexibility  precious  to  the  river 
boatman,  and  offering  the  additional  advantage  of 
a  distinct  economy  in  material.  Pliny  tells  us  that 
the  raft  preceded  the  boat ;  ^  how  the  latter  was 
recognised  as  a  development  of  the  former  may  be 
inferred  from  the  fact  that,  in  Latin,  ratis  means 
both  the  one  and  the  other ;  while  on  the  Arno 
it  is  not  without  significance  that  hccoliuo  —  the 
specific  local  name  of  the  Arno  boat — is  so  easily 
derived  from  bcccoLu  the  slang  word  for  flood -borne 
wood. 

The  process  of  development  here  is  easily  imagined 
1  N.H..  vii.  56. 
P 


2  26  Florence  Past  and  Present 

and  followed.  Where  the  road  met  the  river,  as  soon 
as  commerce  was  on  foot,  the  canoe  would  be  in 
request  to  carry  merchants  and  their  goods  across  ; 
it  was  thus  that  the  fisher  became  a  partner  with  the 
hunter  in  the  new  trade  enterprise.  But  for  such  a 
purpose  the  raft  has  obvious  advantages  over  the 
canoe ;  it  at  once  supports  a  heavier  load  and 
draws  less  water,  and  as  soon  as  beasts  of  burden 
came  to  carry  the  growing  commerce  the  use  of  the 
raft  would  become  a  necessit}-.  Yet  if  the  raft  was 
to  pass  easily  and  surely  between  the  two  fixed  points 
where  the  road  met  the  river  on  either  bank,  it  must 
be  steadied  by  means  of  a  stretched  rope  along  which 
it  might  travel.  Now,  as  soon  as  the  raft  is  thus 
made  to  move  across  current  rather  than  float  down-' 
stream,  its  inherent  weakness  appears  ;  it  becomes  an 
obstacle  over  which  the  water  rises  in  its  flow, 
threatening  to  swamjj  it.  Hence  a  corresponding 
modification  and  new  invention,  whereb)-  the  raft  is 
no  longer  built  foursquare  but  oblong,  and  its  timbers 
tilted  and  brought  to  a  point  at  one  end,  that  which 
faces  up-stream.  Set  now  diagonal)}-,  alike  to  the 
stream  and  the  rope  by  which  it  travels  across,  the 
pointed  and  tilted  raft  divides  the  current  and  makes 
the  journey  safel}'  from  bank  to  bank,  keeping  its 
contents  dr}'.  Such  rafts  arc  actual  1}-  to  be  seen  still 
at  river  ferries  in  the  Archipelago  of  Asia.  The  long 
bamboos  of  which  they  are  built  are  flexible  enough 
to  make  the  raising  of  the  boat's  bow  an  easy  matter  ; 


The  River  Trade  227 

it  is  in  fact  done  by  a  tight  brace  of  rope  stretched 
between  the  bow  and  a  midships  mast,  which  also 
serves  to  keep  the  raft  in  touch  with  the  restraining 
and  directing  rope  of  the  passage.  One  may  suppose 
that  where  bamboowas  not  available — as  in  Tuscan}- — 
the  same  tilt  was  still  gained,  if  less  easily,  by  the 
choice  of  timber  naturally  crooked,  or  by  sheer  shaping 
and  bending  in  the  use  of  flint  or  fire.  Yet  so,  at  last, 
the  workman  is  a  boat-builder,  as  busy  on  such  a 
modified  raft,  and  when  the  last  step  is  taken — when 
such  a  raft  is  set  free  from  the  guiding  rope  of  the 
river  ferry  and  pointed  at  both  ends  instead  of  one — 
it  is  a  boat  indeed,  and  fit  for  any  service  on  the 
stream  to  which  it  owes  its  being.  Yet  not  to  the 
stream  in  general  ;  rather  must  the  discovery  be 
localised  at  those  specific  points  where  the  roads  met 
it.  Thus  again,  on  the  Arno,  the  gofgc  we  have  so 
often  met  asserts  a  new  importance,  and  the  genius 
loci  is  seen  in  a  new  association.  No  wonder  that  the 
boatmen,  as  well  as  those  who  guide  rafts,  are  apt  to 
call  on  San  Gorgone. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  visit  the  Far  East  and  the 
Archipelago  to  find  examples  of  the  raft  on  its  way 
to  become  the  boat.  The  progress  we  have  ven- 
tured to  imagine  is  so  real  that  it  has  left  traces  still 
visible  near  Florence  wherever,  above  or  below  the 
city,  ferries  cross  the  Arno.  The  ferry-boat  of  to-day 
is  enough  to  prove  the  matter  ;  it  supplies  the  inter- 
mediate form  which  is  all  we  need  to  feel  sure  that  the 


2  28  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Arno  boat  has  at  one  time  or  another  been  evolved 
from  the  Arno  raft.  At  Badia  a  Settimo,  Ugnano, 
Peretola,  Rovezzano,  Anchetto  and  Compiobbi — to 
name  no  more  of  these  points  of  convenience- — -you 
will  find  the  nave,  as  it  is  locally  called,  sometimes 
worked  with  a  rope,  sometimes  without,  but  always 
itself;  the  Arno  boat  in  all  essentials  of  structure — 
madili,  palacaniic,  and  palco — yet  in  an  arrested  de- 
velopment that  betra\\s  plainly  the  original  raft  from 
which  that  structure  came.  It  is  the  persistence  of 
traffic  at  these  points  which  has  there  preserved,  in  the 
absence  of  bridges,  something  trul}-  of  the  past ;  the 
raft,  ready  to  become  the  boat  which  the  road  called 
into  being  of  old  as  it  met  the  river. 

Even  were  there  bridges  where  these  navi  now  cross 
the  Arno,  the  past  would  not  be  dead  nor  the  line  of 
development  broken.  For  so  surely  as  the  boat  has 
come  of  the  raft,  the  bridge  stands  but  at  a  later 
point  in  the  same  succession.  The  travelling  rope  of 
the  ferry  easily  becomes  a  mooring  to  which  boats  are 
fastened  at  just  intervals,  their  bows  up-stream  ;  the 
fiat  raft  a  platform,  laid  between  boat  and  boat,  so 
that  men  and  carts  can  cross  easily  on  these  floating 
supports.  I'lightly  was  the  Pont  if  ex — the  bridge- 
builder — associated  with  the  \'estals  at  Rome  on  the 
15th  of  May,  and  naturally  was  the  bridge  itself  the 
altar  wliere  sacrifice  was  then  offered,  for  boat  and 
bridge  bcjth  belong  to  the  same  order  of  things,  which 
early  times  must  have  thought  of  as  the  good  gifts  of 


The  River  Trade  231 

the  guardian  spirits  of  fire  and  water,  of  the  tree  and 
of  the  gorge.  So  bridges  first  rose  at  Candeh',  at 
Florence,  and  at  Signa.  They  are  built  in  stone  to- 
day, but  still,  if  you  look,  )'ou  will  see  the  sign  of  the 
past  in  every  pointed  pier,  set  bow  and  stern  to  the 
stream  like  their  original  the  river-boat.  It  is  the 
river,  flowing  still,  that  has  kept  us  something  of  what 
it  once  created. 


CHAPTER    X 

ON    THE    ROAD 

If  the  boat  took  shape  at  the  ferry,  its  development 
was  certainly  due  in  no  small  degree  to  the  appear- 
ance there  of  the  road,  the  second  great  element  in 
the  being  and  prosperity  of  Florence.  As  one  turns 
to  this  new  subject,  it  presents  several  distinctions  that 
are  sharply  marked.  The  road  is  artificial  ;  the  work 
of  man  rather  than  the  child  of  nature,  as  the 
river  is.  One  may  speak  of  it  as  a  unity,  yet  in 
realit}'  it  is  not  so  ;  there  is  but  one  Arno,  while  the 
roads  are  man\'.  Even  in  Florence,  and  at  the  single 
point  of  her  primitive  ferry,  from  which  the  whole 
cit)'  developed,  how  many  were  the  lines  of  land 
traffic  that  here  fell  in  from  either  side  of  the  stream, 
ready  to  serve  as  the  directives  along  which  the 
growing  city  grouped  her  houses  ?  And  these 
dififerences,  present  from  the  first,  are  here  completed 
in  another,  which  has  emerged  w  ith  the  progress  of 
time  and  the  change  of  circumstance.  The  road,  like 
the  river,  has  seen  its  old  traffic  slacken,  but  this 
decline  is  less  complete  by  land  than  on  the  stream  ; 


On  the  Road 


235 


trade  by  water  is  now  all  but  unknown  at  Florence, 
while  her  roads  still  have  something  to  show,  and 
remain  comparatively  busy.  This  last  difference 
relates  itself  closely  to  that  just  mentioned,  as  effect 
to  cause.  Because  the  river  is  single,  the  competing 
railwa}'    can    follow    its    course,    and     rob    its    trade. 


A   CART    HORSE   AT    REST 


Because  the  roads  are  many,  some  of  them  at  least  are 
sure  to  remain  untouched  by  the  dangerous  rivalr}' 
of  the  steam-driven  wheel.  Very  naturally  then,  what 
is  left  of  Florentine  commerce  movies  to-da\'  by  land, 
and  is  found  on  the  one  road  or  the  other  ;  either  the 
ancient  trade  routes,  or  the  modern  railway  lines  that 
begin,  here  and  there,  to  supplant  them. 


236  Florence  Past  and  Present 

As  the  river  has  its  boats,  so  the  road  shows  its 
carts  ;  and  the  Florentine  cart  is  as  characteristic  a 
piece  of  human  handicraft  as  the  Arno  boat  itself. 
These  carts  are  the  means  b}-  which  the  remaining 
trade  is  carried  on  :  a  more  picturesque  vehicle  it 
would  be  difficult  to  find.  You  will  see  them  in  the 
city,  unloading  at  the  doors  of  wine  shops  ;  the  cart 
propped  in  the  sun  amid  a  litter  of  packing  straw  ; 
the  horses  out,  and  standing  in  the  shade,  well 
muffled  in  their  scarlet  cloths  against  a  chill.  As  you 
look,  you  will  remember  the  ancient  palio  of  which 
Villani  speaks,  and  will  wonder  whether,  in  the  be- 
ginning, when  that  famous  race  was  first  run,  the 
prize  of  the  scarlet  was  not  just  this  :  the  horsecloth 
that  keeps  its  splendid  colour  to-da\-,  and,  who  knows, 
its  ancient  use.  The  whole  cart  is  a  triumph  of  con- 
servatism over  the  forces  of  change  ;  one  of  the  best 
survivals  that  Florence  can  show.  The  carter  stands 
in  the  old  ways,  and,  better  perhaps  than  any  other 
here,  save  only  the  fisher,  represents  his  ancestor,  the 
early  i^lorentine  just  turned  to  trade,  the  first  to 
change  the  hunting  path  for  the  traffic  route.  Such 
a  man,  one  feels,  may  well  keep  the  tradition  of  the 
palio.  Proud  of  his  team,  no  wonder  he  still  chooses 
the  scarlet  as  a  housing  ;  it  means  that  e\cry  horse 
he  drives,  little  as  }'ou  might  think  it,  is  fit  in  his 
opinion  to  win  the  race. 

Notable  anywhere,  the  cart  is  never  so  j)ictures(]ue 
as  in  movement,  whether  in  the  street  or  on  the  road. 


On  the  Road  237 

In  the  cit}',  where  it  is  constantly  busy,  the  cart 
contrasts  finely  with  other  vehicles — the  carriage,  the 
tram-car,  and  the  motor — and  brings  something  still 
of  the  old  world  with  it  as  it  threads  the  modern 
traffic.  But  outside,  on  some  countr}-  road,  it  is 
striking  in  another  sense,  not  by  contrast  but  by 
correspondence  ;  for  all  around,  as  it  moves,  lie  the 
unchanged  conditions  that  have  given  it  being,  so 
that  here  it  is  like  a  picture  found  in  the  ver\'  frame 
for  which  it  was  painted.  Walk  out  then,  till  your 
shoes  are  thick  with  the  dust  that  clings  grey  even  to 
the  lower  green  of  the  dark  cypress  beside  the  road. 
Stay  there  a  moment  in  the  shade  of  the  stone  pine 
while  the  sky  blazes  blue  ;  \'Ou  will  not  have  long  to 
wait.  Sound  comes  first  ;  the  music  of  the  chiming 
bells  ;  then  colour,  in  the  cloths  and  trappings,  the 
bright  brass  and  gay  tassels  of  the  moving  team.  If 
you  have  caught  it  where  the  rising  road  begins  to 
dip  again,  you  will  see  the  cart  well  in  the  breathing 
pause,  when  the  carter  slips  behind  to  tighten  the 
brake  on  the  wheels.  At  his  cr\'  the  team  moves  on, 
the  brake  grinding  and  shrilling  with  the  bells,  the 
carter  pulling  back  on  the  brake-cord,  his  lash  about 
his  shoulders,  the  butt  of  the  whip  trailing  behind  in  the 
rising  dust  that  is  the  first  and  last  note  of  the  Tuscan 
road.  So  the  vision  vanishes  in  a  cloud  ;  it  is  an  im- 
pression and  no  more,  but  one  that  surely  remains. 

These    carts  are    inade  in    country  workshops  for 
the  most  part  ;  such  as  \ou  may  find  open  and  busy 


238 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


by  the  highroad  not  far  from  the  gates  of  Florence  ; 
at  Galluzzo,  for  instance,  or  near  the  bridge  over  the 
Greve  on  the  Pisan  road.  The  local  name  for  the 
cart  is  baroccio,  a  '  tw'O-vvheeler,'  as  in  fact  it  is.  If 
you   would    know    its    structure  in    more  detail  you 


V  i    .         r 

'ID? 

wmm>^^:.-^--''- ■ 

AT    (.ALLUZZO  ;    A    i  AK  1     IN    THE    MAKING 


must  go  to  the  cavradore  w  ho  makes  it.  Like  the 
boat,  the  cart  of  Florence  only  reveals  its  quality  and 
specific  character  when  thus  studied,  and  the  time 
one  spends  on  it  is  repaid  b}'  the  disco\ery  that  the 
first  strong  impression  it  makes  is  full\-  borne  out  by 
the  facts  ;  that  it  has  a  real  and  demonstrable  relation 
to  the  remote  past,  and  may  be  considered  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  of  Florentine  survivals. 


On  the  Road  239 

The  baroccio  is  a  long  open  cart,  narrow  and  flat  ; 
its  body  balanced  on  a  pair  of  high,  light  but  exceed- 
ingly strong  wheels,  and  so  hung  that,  when  it 
travels,  the  back  is  never  far  above  the  ground.  Its 
principal  members  are  the  shafts,  which  not  only  serve 
as  such  in  front,  but  run  backwards  unbroken  to 
form  the  sides  of  the  long  cart-frame  :  they  are 
known  as  the  stangJie.  Six  or  seven  cross-pieces — 
the  traverse — run  from  one  shaft  to  the  other  at 
regular  intervals,  and  support  W\q  picmoni  \  the  planks 
laid  lengthwise — three  to  five  in  number  according  to 
their  width — to  form  the  cart  floor.  Two  of  the 
pianoni  are  longer  than  the  others,  and  project  a  good 
deal  behind,  where  they  are  braced  together  by  the 
last  and  shorter  pair  of  traverse.  This  projection  is 
of  course  much  narrower  than  the  body  of  the  baroccio  ; 
it  thus  forms  a  kind  of  tail,  which  bears  no  load  but 
considerably  lengthens  the  cart  behind.  The  use  of 
such  a  projection  will  presently  appear. 

In  front,  the  shafts  are  sometimes  seen  connected 
by  a  cross-piece,  slightly  curved  so  as  to  clear  the 
haunches  of  the  beast  that  draws  the  cart.  Some 
way  behind  this  brace,  but  still  in  front  of  the  first 
traversa,  a  flat  board  called  the  ponticello  crosses  the 
shafts.  It  is  at  once  fastened  to,  and  raised  above, 
the  shafts  on  a  pair  of  small  brackets,  and  may  be 
doubled  or  trebled  ;  in  which  case  the  whole  comes 
to  resemble  a  flight  of  shallow  wooden  steps,  as  each 
member  of  the  ponticello  rises  higher  than   the  one 


240  Florence  Past  and  Present 

immediately  behind  it.  Such  a  poiticello  is,  as  it 
were,  the  prow  of  the  cart  forward  ;  set  here  as  if  to 
balance  the  projecting  stern  it  carries  behind. 

Below  the  cart-frame  are  several  attachments  which 
deserve  notice.  The  baroccio  has  two  wheels  only, 
and  if  it  is  to  stand  level  when  the  horse  is  not  in  the 
shafts  some  support  must  be  provided.  This  is 
permanentK'  fixed  to  the  front  of  the  cart  frame 
below,  and  takes  the  form  of  a  curved  triangle  of 
wood,  not  unlike  the  breast-bone  of  a  fowl,  with  a 
small  solid  wheel  at  the  apex.  It  travels  clear  of  the 
ground  as  the  cart  moves,  and  comes  to  rest  there  as 
a  prop  for  the  cart  as  soon  as  the  horse  is  taken  out 
of  the  shafts,  its  wheel  allowing  the  cart  to  be  then 
moved  easily  backwards  and  forwards  by  hand. 
This  capra,  as  it  is  called,  consists  of  three  pieces, 
and  between  these  the  carter  often  sets  an  oblong 
basket  to  serve  as  a  '  boot,"  and  to  hold  his  sundries. 
Here  also  hangs,  by  chain  or  cord,  a  tin  lantern,  in  a 
round  basket  frame  of  its  own,  to  light  the  road  as 
the  cart  travels  at  night. 

Passing  from  side  to  side  below  the  centre  of  the 
cart-frame  stands  the  salic,  as  the  carradore  of 
Florence  calls  it — the  iron  axle  of  the  wheels — shut 
in  its  wooden  box,  the  cassa  dclla  sallc.  Just  behind 
this  comes  a  singular  attachment,  the  vcricello.  To 
see  it  you  must  imagine  a  wooden  mallet,  like  those 
used  for  croquet,  with  a  c}-lindrical  head  and  short 
flat  siiaft  carr\'ing  in  its  ti^j  a  double  pullc}'  of  brass. 


On  the  Road  241 

The  head  of  the  vericello  has  a  pivot  at  each  end 
working  in  a  socket  dropped  from  the  cart  floor. 
Thus  the  shaft  is  free  to  describe  an  arc  below  the 
cart  with  its  pulley,  and  the  purpose  of  the  arrange- 
ment is  to  give  a  shifting  point  (tappiii  for  the  long 
cords  that  control  the  drag  ;  a  matter  which,  in  the 
case  of  a  heavy  load  carried  on  two  wheels  only,  is 
of  great  importance. 

The  drag  itself,  or  viartinicca  as  the  Florentines 
call  it,  consists  of  a  strong  wooden  bar  set  transversely 
below  the  cart  just  behind  the  wheels.  Irons  hold  the 
bar  in  contact  with  the  cart-frame,  yet  are  wide  enough 
to  give  it  some  play,  allowing  it  to  slide  backwards 
and  forwards.  At  each  end  this  bar  carries,  in  the  plane 
of  the  wheel,  a  great  wooden  '  shoe,' which,  when  the  bar 
slides  forward,  presses  on  the  wheel  and  acts  as  a  power- 
ful drag.  This  action  is  controlled  by  a  double  cord 
fastened  first  to  the  drag-bar,  then  brought  forward  and 
threaded  in  the  pulley  of  the  movable  vericello,  then 
back  to  find  a  similar  pulle}'  set  in  the  cart-tail.  The 
first  pulley  alone  comes  into  play  when  the  harocciaio 
follows  his  cart  on  foot  ;  he  sets  the  drag  on  b)' 
simpl)-  pulling  the  cords  from  behind.  The  second 
serves  him  when  he  chooses  to  go  down-hill  riding  on 
the  front  of  the  cart,  for  the  long  cords  then  come  to 
his  hand  over  the  whole  load,  and  by  this  pulley 
keep  him  still  in  touch  with  the  whole  complicated 
mechanism  of  the  vericello  and  the  inartiiiicca ;  he 
has  but  to  pull  them  and  the  drag  acts  at  once. 

Q 


242  Florence  Past  and  Present 

The  wheels  of  the  baroccio  are,  as  the  name  indicates, 
its  essential  feature.  High  and  slim,  they  measure 
well  over  five  feet  in  diameter  with  a  tyre  breadth 
of  barel)'  two  inches  and  a  half.  The  nave  projects 
considerably,  and  tapers  outwards  from  the  wheel, 
which  is  scarcely  '  dished  '  at  all.  The  nave  is 
known  as  the  inor;f:o ;  the  spokes  are  the  razze  in  the 
common  talk  of  the  carradore  ;  the  felloes  quarti, 
and  the  iron  tyre  the  cerchioue.  The  linch-pin,  or 
acciaierino,  made  of  steel  as  the  name  indicates,  as  it 
rises  from  the  axle  is  bent  sharply  back  and  inwards 
over  the  nave.  This  return  is  beaten  out  flat  in  the 
shape  of  a  pointed  leaf  ;  it  serves  well  as  a  step  when 
the  carter  would  climb  his  cart  as  it  moves,  for  so  the 
acciaierino  gives  him  a  steady  if  slight  toe-hold  above 
the  revolving  nave. 

In  the  parts  just  described,  the  baroccio  is  complete 
as  regards  its  essentials.  But  the  habit — probably 
comparatively  recent — of  using  it  to  convey  wine  in 
flasks  has  brought  about  the  invention  and  addition 
of  a  fitting  meant  to  adapt  the  cart  to  this  difficult 
load.  The  flask,  as  every  one  knows,  is  of  glass,  and 
though  the  glass  is  singularl}'  tough,  and  is  protected 
from  shocks  by  a  close  wrapping  of  twisted  reed 
leaves  worked  about  the  body,  two  hundred  or  so  of 
these  vessels,  full  of  wine,  form  a  load  that  requires 
careful  packing  and  adjustment  if  it  is  to  travel  safely. 
Stability  is  here  the  prime  necessity,  and  to  secure  it 
the  flasks  are  built  on  the  cart  in  a  kind  of  pyramid, 


On  the  Road  243 

narrow  above  and  broad  below,  with  plenty  of  straw 
between  flask  and  flask.  Yet  even  so  there  is  danger 
of  the  fragile  load  shifting  on  the  cart  and  so  falling 
to  ruin,  for  the  cart  itself  has  no  sides  to  hinder  such 
movement.  Hence  the  cart  is  completed  for  the 
purpose  in  question  by  the  ccsta,  a  long  shallow  tray 
formed  within  a  double  frame  of  strong  wood  by  the 
interlacing  of  many  flat  and  flexible  wooden  strips. 
The  cesta,  when  in  use,  is  laid  on  the  cart  floor,  with 
which  its  size  corresponds,  and  is  held  firml}'  in 
position  there  by  the  ritti,  short  wooden  uprights  set 
in  iron  sockets  attached  to  the  outside  of  the  cart- 
frame.  The  effect  of  this  addition  is  to  give  the  cart 
sides  when  the  nature  of  the  load  requires  them.  If 
the  cart  is  to  be  used  to  carry  sand,  it  is  boxed-in  for 
this  purpose  by  simple  boards  set  on  edge  and 
supported  b\'  the  ii'tti,  but  these  sand  carts  are 
barocci  of  a  degenerate  type  with  which  we  have  little 
concern  here.  The  ccsta  reduced,  deepened,  and  set 
by  itself  on  a  pair  of  small  wheels,  forms  a  hand-cart 
often  seen  in  the  streets  of  Florence. 

Except  the  axle  and  linch-pins,  the  t)Tes,  pulleys, 
and  a  few  external  fittings,  the  whole  baroccio  is  made 
of  wood,  but  in  a  singular  variety  of  this  material. 
Beech  is  chosen  for  the  shafts  ;  the  traverse  and 
ponticelli  ^.re  oi  &\ra  \  cypress  is  taken  for  the  planks 
of  the  floor  ;  the  capra,  the  drag,  and  the  axle-box  are 
made  of  acacia,  the  spokes  and  vericello  of  ilex,  and 
the   wheel-naves  and  felloes   of  walnut.     As    to    the 


244  Florence  Past  and  Present 

ccsta,  its  double  frame — the  tclaio  a'.id  coiitrotclaio — is 
of  elm,  but  the  rest  is  woven  of  strips — stecche  they 
are  called — made  of  chestnut.  Thus  no  less  than 
seven  kinds  of  wood  are  used  before  the  cart  is 
complete.  These  barocci  are  finished  by  painting, 
which  is  done  in  one  colour,  generally  crimson,  but 
sometimes  dark  blue. 

The  Florentine  cart  belongs,  of  course,  to  the 
later  world  of  the  wheel,  and  of  the  easier  road  which 
the  wheel  made  necessary  and  brought  into  fashion. 
Yet  when  one  studies  it  further,  it  is  seen  to  preserve 
not  a  little  of  the  remoter  past  ;  it  has  carried  more 
than  the  load  for  which  it  was  designed,  and  has 
brought  down  to  our  own  day  distinct  traces  of  the 
still  simpler  traffic  it  supplanted.  To  recognise  the 
first  and  most  important  of  these,  it  will  be  necessary 
to  say  something  of  the  team,  and  of  the  harness 
which  attaches  it  to  the  baroccio. 

Rarely  is  a  baroccio  of  full  size  seen  moving  behind 
a  single  horse  or  mule  ;  the  team  consists  of  two  or 
three  beasts,  ill  matched  according  to  our  ideas,  but 
curiously  picturesque  in  their  variet}-  of  height  and 
strength.  The  largest  walks  between  the  shafts  ;  he 
may  be  a  horse  or  a  heavily  built  mule.  The  others 
— smaller  mules,  or  a  mule  and  a  pony — are  set  to 
draw  from  swingle-bars,  one  on  each  side,  pulling  on 
chains  hung  diagonally  between  the  shafts  and  the 
cart-body.  The  team  is  known  as  the  gubbia,  or 
batteria^  and  the  arrangement  described  is  local,  or  at 


On  the  Road  245 

least  peculiarly  Tuscan,  being  known  in  common 
carters'  talk  as  the  '  attacco  alia  Maremmana,'  to 
distinguish  it  from  the  tandem,  or  'attacco  alia 
Lombarda,'  rarely  seen  south  of  the  Apennine,  It  is 
evident  that  the  use  of  a  light  team  rather  than  a 
single  draught  animal  depends  on  the  fact  that  heavy 
horses  are  not  commonly  bred  in  Tuscany,  and  this 
qualit)'  of  the  race  has  another  consequence  ;  it  in- 
fluences curiously  the  method  of  harnessing,  which 
must  now  be  examined. 

The  essential  parts  of  the  Tuscan  harness  are  the 
head-piece  or  briglie,  the  breast-strap  or  petto,  the 
breeching  or  iinbraco,  and  the  saddle.  The  briglie 
carry  blinkers,  and,  generally,  a  bit ;  if  not,  the  reins 
are  so  attached  as  to  close  the  animal's  nostrils  when 
pulled.  T\\Q.  petto  is  a  wide  strap  of  leather — it  takes 
the  place  of  the  horse-collar  we  are  accustomed  to 
see — which  runs  back  in  a  rope  trace  on  each  side  to 
find  the  rings  set  at  each  end  of  the  tirante,  or 
swingle-bar.  The  saddle  is  very  curious.  From  a 
wooden  foundation — Xh^fitsto — it  rises  to  a  horn  in 
front  covered  with  sheet  brass  or  studded  with  brass 
nails.  This/c?' /////(?  drila  sella,  as  it  is  called,  has  two 
main  forms,  one  cut  scjuare  at  top,  the  other  curved,  but 
both  pointing  forward.  The  square  form  is  tradition- 
ally that  proper  to  a  mule  saddle,  the  other  to  that  of 
a  horse,  but  I  have  not  found  this  distinction  much 
observed  in  practice.  The  nails  arc  more  commonly 
seen  on  pallinioi  the  first  form,  and  the  sheet  brass  on 


246 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


the  others.  In  either  case  ihe. palliuo  forms  one  piece 
with  the  wooden  foundation  of  the  saddle.  More 
interesting  than  such  details  is  the  mechanical  problem 
of  traction,  and  the  way  it  is  solved  in  the  Florentine 
cart. 

The  principal  draught  animal  is  harnessed  so  that 


A    TUSCAN    SADDLE 


the  ends  of  the  shafts  hardlx'  reach  further  forward 
th.an  the  saddle,  where,  when  tlic  cart  is  loaded,  they 
are  kept  very  high  ;  t>ften  rising  ahoNc  tlic  saddle 
itself,  acnxss  which  they  are  braced  strongly  by  many 
plies  of  strapping  or  of  cord.  This  bracing  lies  in 
the  crutches  of  two  wooden  bridges — the  bastoni,  or 


On  the  Road  249 

arcioni — fastened  obliquely  to  the  saddle  itself,  one 
on  each  side.  The  bracing;,  if  simple,  would  tend  to 
sag ;  it  is  theref<jre  twisted,  and  kept  tight  in  the 
manner  of  a  tourniquet  by  an  inserted  stick,  which 
the  recoil  of  the  twist  brings  to  rest  against  the 
curved  piece  of  wood  already  mentioned,  that  which 
connects  the  shafts  over  the  haunches  of  the  horse. 
The  whole  scheme  evidently  depends  on  the  cart 
being  so  trimmed  as  to  throw  the  weight  behind  and 
lift  the  shafts  high  ;  with  the  effect  that  the  load, 
however  heav}',  hardly  presses  at  all  on  the  back  of 
the  animal  between  the  shafts  ;  he  carries  little  more 
than  his  saddle,  and  draws  straight  from  the  swingle- 
bar  which  the  level  traces  connect  with  his  breast- 
piece.  Thus  in  the  Tuscan  team  ever\'  animal,  even 
the  one  between  the  shafts,  works  free,  in  a  device 
perfectly  suited  to  local  circumstances,  and  to  a 
breed  of  horse  which  must  make  up  by  numbers  for 
what  it  lacks  in  weight  and  strength. 

Now,  when  one  comes  to  think  of  it,  here,  in  the 
persistence  of  their  race  and  use,  the  mule  and  the 
light  horse  are  a  remarkable  survival  of  the  first 
days  of  Tuscan  trade,  when  just  such  animals  walked 
the  roads  and  climbed  the  hills  as  beasts  of  burden 
before  the  cart  was  heard  of  Logically,  a  change 
should  have  come  with  the  appearance  of  the  wheel, 
and  thenceforward,  \\ith  new  care,  horses  should  have 
been  bred  for  size,  weight,  and  strength.  Yet  it  is 
not  so  ;  the  heavy  work  of  Tuscany  in  this  kind  is 


250  Florence  Past  and  Present 

done  by  the  slow  white  oxen  that  pull  the  plough, 
and  the  breed  of  horse  is  still  pretty  much  what  it 
has  always  been  ;  drawing  its  original,  its  points  and 
its  defects,  from  the  half-wild  Maremmano.  '  Non 
appetta  bene'  says  the  Italian  groom;  the  Tuscan 
breed  has  a  narrow  chest  and  falling  stern,  with  all 
his  hardihood  and  fire.  Little  or  no  care  is  taken  of 
the  native  horse,  and  the  introduciion  of  foreign 
blood  is  not  favoured,  as  it  is  thought  to  make  the 
progen)^  less  hardy.  The  barocciaio  prefers  to  work 
with  what  he  has,  setting  three  to  do  the  task  of  one, 
and  gathering  to-day  in  his  battcria,  gay  with  tinkling 
bells  and  scarlet  housings,  the  very  material  once 
used  on  the  road  as  pack  animals  by  his  remote 
ancestors. 

Returning  then  to  the  horse  in  the  cart,  one  sees 
that  the  persistence  of  his  race  is  responsible  for 
certain  peculiarities  which  betray  the  unchanged 
habits  of  an  earlier  age.  If  you  go  to  the  Val  di 
Marina,  perhaps  the  road  nearest  to  Florence  where 
pack  animals  are  still  working,  you  will  notice  that 
the  sacks  of  charcoal  or  faggots  of  wood,  tied  in  pairs 
to  the  basto  or  pack-saddle,  are  trimmed  so  as  to 
hang  long  and  low  behind,  and  high  and  short  in  front. 
The  reason  seems  to  be  that  the  beast  of  burden 
may  have  his  shoulders  and  chest  free.  Thus  the 
very  trimming  of  the  cart,  which  repeats  in  its  rising 
shafts  the  same  line  in  the  same  situation,  is  a  relic 
of  the  past.     The  barocciaio  still  uses  a  beast  whose 


On  the  Road  253 

shoulders  and  chest  are  his  weak  point,  and  saves 
him  there  by  a  device  that  leads  straight  back  to  the 
still  older  arrangement  of  the  soma,  or  double  load, 
slung  to  the  saddle.  One  might  add  that  the  bastoni, 
or  saddle-bridges,  are  derived  et\'mologically  from 
the  basto,  and  have  been  probably  developed  and 
modified  from  some  fitting  invented  first  for  that 
primitive  pack-saddle. 

Even  when  considered  in  itself,  the  Florentine 
baroccio  shows  more  than  one  feature  connecting  it 
with  the  habits  of  the  earlier  trade  it  supplanted. 
When  the  nature  of  the  load  demanded  it,  the  pack- 
horse  or  mule  carried  a  pair  of  cestc — wide,  deep 
baskets — one  on  each  side  of  the  saddle.  Ccste  or 
corbclli — for  the  names  are  synonjanous  —  of  this 
shape  are  still  to  be  seen,  and  their  structure,  a 
wicker-work  of  flat  wooden  strips,  exactly  corre- 
sponds with  what  has  already  been  described.  It  is 
thus  prett)'  sure  that  the  ccsta  of  the  baroccio  is  a 
mere  adaptation  to  the  cart  of  a  device  used  before 
carts  were  thought  of  here  ;  the  more  that  the  long 
flat  cesta  laid  on  the  baroccio,  and  at  first  sight  so 
unlike  the  others,  resembles  them  in  consisting  of  a 
pair,  enclosed  in  its  single  frame. 

The  load  to  be  carried,  however,  was  not  alwa}'s 
such  as  the  pair  of  cestc  could  hold.  It  might  be 
wine  or  oil,  and  for  the  transport  of  these  licjuids  the 
ceste  were  replaced  by  a  pair  of  barrels  slung  like 
them,   one    on   each    side   of  the  pack-saddle.      It   is 


2  54  Florence  Past  and  Present 

easy  to  see  that  the  Tuscan  barrel,  like  many 
another  convenience,  has  been  e\olvecl  gradually 
under  pressure  of  inevitable  circumstances.  As  the 
dug-out  canoe  preceded  the  boat  proper,  so  the 
barrel  in  its  original  must  have  been  a  simple  thing  : 
the  mere  section  of  a  tree-trunk,  hollowed  out  as  the 
canoe  was ;  fitted  with  ends,  and  pierced  with  a 
bung-hole.  This  stage  of  invention  has  left  traces  of 
itself  in  language,  for  the  word  fusto  means  alike  the 
trunk  of  a  tree  and  a  small  keg.  So  too,  Ramsay 
the  poet  talks,  in  his  Scots  tongue,  of  barrels  as 
'  nine-gallon  trees ' ;  ^  the  matter  indeed  is  simple 
enough  to  be  world-wide  in  its  use  and  survival 
alike. 

The  final  stage,  that  of  the  true  barrel,  was  gained 
in  a  development  which  exactl}-  corresponded  to 
what  we  have  already  seen  in  the  case  of  the  boat. 
The  boat  found  the  form  of  the  canoe  and  imitated  it 
by  true  structure.  So  the  barrel  took  \\\q  fiisto — the 
hollow  tree-trunk — for  a  model,  and  reproduced  it  in 
the  crafty  combination  of  a  cunning  carpentry.  The 
Tuscan  barrel,  like  the  Arno  boat,  has  risen  naturally, 
and  gives  proof  of  this  origin  in  details  which  speak 
not  so  much  of  the  present  as  of  the  past,  and  of  the 
early  conditions  of  that  simpler  traffic  to  which  it  was 
exactly  adapted. 

The  body  of  the  barrel  consists  of  staves — called 
doghe — made  of  pine  wood,  gathered  and  held  in  place 

1  Elegy  on  Lucky  /Fwrt' (Edinburgh,  1721),  p.  34. 


On  the  Road  255 

by  hoops — cerchi — of  bent  chestnut,  and  themselves 
including  the  flat  heads — the  fondi — also  cut  from 
pine  planks.  One  of  the  staves,  however,  differs  from 
the  rest  both  in  material  and  in  form.  It  is  made  of 
beech-wood,  and  cut  out  of  the  solid  in  such  a  way  as 
to  leave  a  block  projecting  in  the  middle.  7~his  block 
is  some  two  and  a  half  inches  thick,  and  through  it 
the  bung-hole  is  bored  so  that  a  cork  fills  it  as  tightly 
as  if  the  hole  were  the  neck  of  a  bottle.  In  these 
details  there  is  nothing  very  remarkable  ;  the  interest 
comes  rather  when  one  observes  the  resultant  form  to 
which  their  combination  gives  rise. 

A  glance  at  the  barrel  itself  will  do  more  than  pages 
of  description  to  make  its  peculiarity  plain.  It  is 
small,  yet  differs  from  the  kegs  used  elsewhere, 
being  longer  in  proportion  to  its  girth  than  these. 
The  sides  are  curiousl)'  flattened  too,  so  that,  if  cut 
across,  the  barrel  in  section  would  give  the  form  of  an 
oblong  with  rounded  corners  ;  yet  an  oblong  defined 
everywhere  by  curves,  bolder  or  flatter,  rather  than  by 
straight  lines.  One  notices  too  that  at  each  end  the 
head  of  the  barrel  is  set  deeph',  and  that  the  staves 
project  a  good  deal  be\'ond  it. 

Now  none  of  these  peculiarities  is  without  signifi- 
cance. To  begin  with  the  last :  the  projecting  ring  of 
staves  is  meant  to  give  a  good  hand-grip  to  the  man 
who  lifts  the  barrel,  and  its  length — one  may  add — is 
calculated  not  to  exceed  the  spread  of  his  arms,  just 
as  its  weight  when  full  is  not  too  heavy  for  his  strength. 


256  Florence  Past  and  Present 

It  is  to  a  place  at  the  side  of  the  pack-saddle  he  raises 
it,  and  this  is  the  reason  of  the  strange  flattening  in 
the  form  of  the  barrel  ;  it  is  made  to  fit  the  place 
where  it  is  to  hang  and  travel.  Finally,  it  is  to  be 
balanced  there  by  another  of  the  same  shape  and  size 
hung  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  saddle,  and  therefore, 
just  as  the  single  barrel  must  not  be  too  heavy  for  a 
man  to  lift,  so  the  pair  must  not  be  too  much  for  the 
animal  that  is  to  carry  them.  The  Tuscan  barrel, 
then,  not  only  belongs  in  form  and  size  to  the  earlier 
epoch  of  trade  carried  on  b\'  the  help  of  the  pack- 
horse,  but  has  a  definite  relation  in  these  peculiarities 
to  two  dominant  factors  in  nature  :  the  local  breed 
of  burden-bearing  animals,  and  the  lie  of  the  country 
to  be  crossed  in  this  traffic.  The  barrel,  in  short, 
represents  exactly  half  the  fair  load  of  such  a  beast  on 
the  average  Tuscan  trade  route,  taking  the  plain  and 
the  hill  together.  As  a  matter  of  fact  such  a  load — 
the  soma,  or  pair  of  barrels — is  still  a  known  unit  of 
commerce  in  the  local  market,  and  corresponds  in 
quantity  to  about  one  hundred  litres  of  wine.  It  is 
a  clear  survival  of  early  methods  of  transport. 

It  would  be  easy  to  carr\'  the  matter  into  further 
detail,  and  to  bring  it  still  nearer  daily  experience. 
The  wine-flask,  which  the  waiter  sets  on  your  table  at 
the  restaurant  even  if  you  do  not  call  for  it,  belongs  to 
the  same  order  of  things,  and  owes  its  definite  capacity 
to  the  same  ultimate  factors.  It  is  blown  to  hold  the 
twentieth  part  of  a  Tuscan  barrel  ;  that  is,  two  litres 


On  the  Road  257 

and  a  half.  Next  time  you  admire  its  simple  perfect 
form  as  it  stands  wrapped  in  its  covering  of  sa/a,  you 
may  remember  that  the  far  background  of  the  flask, 
as  of  the  barrel  whose  contents  it  brings  so  well  to 
your  hand,  is  indeed  the  Tuscan  country  making  itself 
felt  here  through  the  beasts  of  burden  it  breeds  and 
the  roads  it  admits.  It  is  no  figure  of  speech  that 
describes  the  flask  as  '  racy  of  the  soil '  ;  it  is  so,  as 
much  or  more  than  the  wine  it  holds. 

Coming  back  for  a  moment  to  the  barrel  from  which 
the  flask  is  filled,  we  find  in  it  another  power  ;  it  not 
only  determines  the  size  of  the  flask  but,  in  another 
relation,  that  of  the  cart  as  well  ;  the  new  means  of 
carriage  now  used  for  barrels  and  flasks  alike.  The 
Tuscan  barrel  holds  its  fifty  litres  within  a  definite 
compass,  narrow  rather  than  broad  because  of  the 
flattening  of  its  sides,  which  were  so  made  to  meet 
the  sides  of  the  pack-saddle.  In  the  cart  they  still, 
because  of  this  peculiarity,  have  the  advantage  of  fit- 
ting nicely  together,  so  that  the  barrels  laid  lengthwise 
fill  the  space  well  and  do  not  easiU-  shift,  as  they 
might  were  their  section  circular.  Three  barrels  laid 
side  by  side  are  enough  ;  not  indeed  to  form  a  load, 
but  to  fill  the  cart  from  side  to  side.  Thus  the  barrel 
is  the  unit  of  the  cart  measurement,  and  as  the  barrel 
itself  is  determined  as  we  have  seen,  the  primitive 
conditions  of  traffic  are  evidently  still  operative  in  the 
sense  of  limiting,  through  the  shape  they  have  given 
to  the  barrel,  the  later  vehicle  that  now  carries  it. 

R 


CHAPTER   XI 

AMULETS 

The  harness  of  the  Tuscan  cart  is  ornamental  as 
well  as  useful  ;  it  is  indeed  the  decorative  value  of 
the  whole  that  first  strikes  the  eye  of  the  observer. 
It  has  bells,  greater  and  lesser,  for  sound,  and  much 
polished  brass  about  it  for  brightness,  while  wool  and 
fur  add  their  own  charms  of  texture  and  notes  of 
colour.  Even  the  least  details  of  these  trappings  are 
worth  study,  for  they  not  only  confirm  the  first  im- 
pression, but  enforce  it  in  another ;  that  of  the 
strangeness  which  seems  to  hold  a  hidden  meaning 
behind  what  is  merely  bright  and  gay.  The  bells  are 
of  two  kinds,  and  the  carter  is  proud  to  have  them 
ring  in  harmony.  The  brass  of  the  saddle  often 
takes  the  form  of  a  seri)ent,  or  bears  a  crescent  moon 
swinging  from  the  knob  of  the  palliuo.  Sometimes 
this  pommel  carries  a  standard — the  vcntamola — 
rising  through  two  or  more  flat  plates  of  brass  hung 
round  with  small  bells,  and  crowned  with  a  turning 
flag  or  vane    of  the    same    metal.       Sometimes    the 

•258 


Amulets 


259 


standard  is  shorter,  and  bears  only  a  highly  polished 
metal  ball  ;  as  it  were  a  universal  mirror  that  the 
sun  cannot  miss.  Mirrors  of  silvered  glass  too, — the 
sperine,  or  little  spheres — oblong  or  round,  in  various 
settings,  may  be  seen  hung  between  the  horses'  eyes, 
or    dangling   from    a  tufted    strap    in    front   of  their 


MULE-TASSELS   AND    HELL 


chests.  Foxes'  tails  are  apt  to  swing  at  the  cheek 
straps,  sometimes  wnth  a  wild  boar's  tusk  beside  them. 
A  realK'  fine  set  of  harness  is  bordered  throughout 
with  badger-fur  set  at  the  seam  between  leather  and 
lining,  and  coloured  wool  shows  everywhere,  in  great 
tassels  of  red  and  blue,  ball  and  fringe  and  plait 
work,   hung  from  the  headstalls  chiefly,  but    mixed 


26o  Florence  Past  and  Present 

too  with  the  shining,  chiming  standard  above  the 
saddle.  These  coloured  wools,  tufted  and  clipped 
close,  often  replace  badger-fur  as  an  alternative 
border  and  setting  for  the  bright  glass  of  the  swing- 
ing mirrors,  and  are  always  to  be  found  sewn  to  a 
flap  of  cloth  in  front  of  the  gabbia ;  the  great  nose- 
bag of  plaited  cord  carried  by  cart  horse  and  mule 
alike. 

Such  variety  and  complexity  of  ornament,  com- 
bined with  such  insistence  on  certain  constantly 
recurring  details,  suggest  that  there  may  be  a  mean- 
ing here  more  than  meets  the  eye.  The  poorest, 
humblest  barocciaio  with  his  sand  cart,  if  he  can  afford 
nothing  better,  will  plant  a  bright  tuft  of  sala — the 
dyed  flower  of  the  great  reed — at  his  horse's  ear,  or 
will  mimic  cheaply  the  brass  saddle-vane  with  a 
whirligig  of  coloured  paper  set  in  the  same  place. 
There  is  a  passion  for  this  adornment  of  the  labour- 
ing beast,  and  a  tradition  of  form  in  the  horse  trap- 
pings of  Tuscany,  which  suggest  that  the  common 
distinction  is  inapplicable  here :  that  the  ornamental 
must  be,  to  those  who  thus  demand  and  procure  it, 
the  useful  as  well.  What  use  it  is  supposed  to  have 
we  must  now  try  to  see. 

Take  the  whole  as  a  hieroglyphic,  of  which  the 
determinative  must  be  found  if  the  true  sense  is  to 
appear.  More  primitive  and  central  than  any  other 
part  of  the  harness  is  the  saddle,  and  if  you  look 
past  its  obvious  brightness,  and   under  the  strapping 


Amulets  261 

or  twisted  cord  that  connects  it  with  the  shafts,  }'ou 
will  find  carved  and  painted  on  the  bastoiii  the  sign 
that  gives  the  key  to  the  decorative  system.  It  is  an 
eye,  cut  in  the  wood  by  simple  gouge  work,  or  out- 
lined there  b)-  the  painter,  and  often  coloured  too, 
as  if  to  enhance  its  modest  importance  ;  the  ball 
tinted  blue,  and  the  gouge  cuts  that  define  it  red. 
If  there  is  any  meaning  here  at  all,  the  sense 
cannot  be  doubtful.  This  is  a  counter-charm 
against  the  evil  eye,  for  the  eye  itself,  as  many  a 
relic  of  antiquity — Egyptian  and  other — proves,  has 
been  used  b}^  man  from  the  earliest  times  in  this 
prophylactic  magic.  Were  there  the  least  doubt  of 
its  meaning  where  we  have  found  it,  the  blue  colour 
often  given  to  the  ball  would  put  the  matter  beyond 
question.  To  this  day  in  Syria  the  people  suppose 
that  men  or  women  with  blue  eyes  have,  in  a  high 
degree,  the  fatal  power  of  fascination,  and  to  avert 
it  they  form  and  hang — to  children,  horses,  or  fruit- 
trees — discs  of  blue  paste  marked  with  the  figure  of 
an  eye.^  So  too,  and  for  the  same  purpose,  horses 
and  mules  are  hung  with  blue  beads  in  Greece.-     One 

'  Folk-Loie,  xiii.  2  (June,  1902),  p.  202. 

^  J.  C.  Lawson,  Greek  Folk-Lore  (Cambridge,  1910),  p.  12.  In 
the  second  room  of  the  Vetulonia  collections  at  the  Museo  Archeo- 
logico,  Florence,  such  eyes  may  be  seen  modelled  in  blue  and 
white  paste.  As  they  accompany  a  statuette  of  the  Egyptian  god- 
dess Mut,  their  origin  is  certain.  In  this  early  importation  by  sea 
the  circle  of  diffusion  is  complete.  For  blue  beads  found  in  '  Roman 
Tombs,'  see  G.  Bellucci,  //  Fcticisino  priiiiitivo  (Perugia,  1907)7 
p.  52. 


262  Florence  Past  and  Present 

more  step  westward  and  we  are  in  Tuscany,  where 
the  same  sign  must  be  surely  taken  to  have  the 
same  meaning.  But  if  this  is  sure  a  high  proba- 
bility follows  ;  that  this  eye  on  the  saddle-bridges 
is  a  determinant  which  gives  the  key  to  the  hidden 
meaning  of  the  whole  ornament  lavished  on  the 
harness  about  it.  The  sign  tells  us  that  the  supersti- 
tion of  the  evil  eye  is  known  in  Tuscany;  may 
not  the  other  singularities  the  harness  shows  prove 
to  be  developments  of  the  same  system  of  magical 
defence  ? 

Those  who  believe  in  fatal  fascination  trust  much, 
and  naturally,  to  distraction  as  a  means  of  averting 
what  they  dread.  If  the  glance  of  the  envious  and 
evil  can  be  turned  aside,  it  will  spread  itself  harm- 
lessly, as  an  arrow  or  stone  that  the  shield  has 
deflected.  So,  in  general,  the  whole  bright  decoration 
of  the  labouring  horse  or  mule  would  clearly  have 
this  advantage  ;  would  belong,  even  as  mere  ornament, 
to  the  very  system  that  the  sign  on  the  saddle  has 
made  so  probable.  The  accent  here  falls  of  course 
on  the  colour— red  or  blue — of  the  tufted  wool,  and 
even  more  definitely  on  the  light  reflected  from  the 
harness  studs,  the  pallino  with  its  shining  ball,  and 
the  swinging  mirrors  that  form  part  of  the  trappings  ; 
these  details  draw  and  fix  the  eye  of  the  observer  so 
that  he  hardly  notices  the  animal  for  whose  protection 
the  whole  has  been  contrived. 

This  superstition  has  elaborated,  on  the  same  line 


THE    WISE    WIVES    OF    TUSCANY 


Amulets  265 

of  thought,  a  still  deeper  and  more  crafty  diversion 
of  the  eye.  Objects  are  found  or  contrived  whose 
appeal  is  to  the  sense  of  number  and  order.  When 
presented  to  it,  these  attract  the  '  eye,'  and  at  the 
same  time  baffle  it ;  entangling  the  envious  glance 
in  a  vain  attempt  to  count  and  sum  up  their  intricacies. 
The  magic  of  all  countries  is  full  of  this  device,  which 
has  been  recognised  in  the  broken  patterns  of  eastern 
carpets,  and  might  be  found,  who  knows,  even  in  the 
studied  irregularities  of  mediaeval  architecture.  As 
regards  Tuscany,  a  simple  art,  still  followed  in  the 
straw  industry  near  Florence,  has  been  considered 
important  as  a  means  of  magical  defence.  '  Twist 
and  plait  everything  you  make,'  says  the  Tuscan 
wise-woman,  '  let  it  take  the  form  of  two  or  three 
serpents  interlaced  .  .  .  and  when  you  sew  clothes 
for  man  or  woman  let  your  stitch  be  such  that  the 
threads  cross  ;  the  stitch  that  shoemakers  use  .  .  . 
for  so  the  witches  can  do  nothing,  as  they  cannot 
count  either  twisted  thread  or  crossed  stitch  ;  their 
eye  is  confused  by  what  they  see.  It  is  well  to  plait 
cotton,  silk  or  wool  seven  or  eight-fold  for  this  purpose, 
and  to  carry  the  plait  in  one's  pocket  as  a  charm. 
You  may  even  find  such  things  ready  made  in  the 
shops,  and  in  several  colours,  for  they  are  a  protection 
against  the  malocchio.'  ^  So  when,  among  the  bright 
colour  of  the  nappe,  the  woollen  tassels,  red,  blue  and 

'  Unpublished  MS.  of  a  Tuscan  witch  collected  by  C.   G.   Leland 
and  now  in  my  possession. 


266  Florence  Past  and  Present 

yellow,  that  hang  at  the  horses'  heads,  plaited  work 
appears  as  it  often  does — strands  of  twisted  and 
crossed  threads  that  connect  the  upper  to  the  lower 
bunches  of  balls  in  the  tassel — we  do  not  pass  the 
matter  as  trivial,  or  merely  ornamental,  for  it  has  a 
meaning  of  its  own.  The  coloured  tresses  here 
combine  with  their  magic  surroundings  ;  belong  to 
the  same  world  of  mystery,  and  have  been  doubtless 
contrived  to  add  their  own  peculiar  power  to  the 
general  system  of  defence. 

There  is  some  reason  to  think  that  the  same  result 
was  sought  in  sound,  or  at  least  that  the  tinkling  of 
the  bells  attached  to  the  harness  had  a  definite  magic 
value  for  those  who  first  hung  them  there.  These 
bells  are  of  two  kinds  ;  the  hnbholi,  or  hollow  globes  of 
metal  with  a  solid  metal  ball  left  loose  within  to  ring 
them  at  every  movement,  and  an  eyed  slit  by  which 
the  sound  escapes  ;  and  the  squillc,  oblong  or  conical, 
with  open  mouth  and  the  usual  clapper  hung  within. 
The  former  are  large  bells,  generally  fastened  to 
the  traces  of  the  cart,  the  latter  are  quite  small,  and 
may  be  seen,  four  or  six  together,  sewn  to  a  loose 
strap  about  the  horse's  neck,  where  they  swing  and 
tinkle  gaily. 

The  same  authority  that  has  given  us  the  hidden 
meaning  of  the  tress  or  plait,  reports  that  in  popular 
Tuscan  belief  the  bell  has  like  efficacy  and  for  a 
similar  reason.  It  is  to  be  carried  in  the  pocket,  she 
says,    because    so    '  the    witches    cannot    count    the 


Amulets  267 

strokes  of  the  clapper  '—quantc  volte  il  pallino  battc} 
There  ma}'  indeed  be  doubt  how  far  this  explanation 
is  applicable  to  horse-bells  unmuffled  and  ringing 
freely  on  the  road,  but  at  least  the  main  fact  is  sure, 
that  the  bell  has  a  magic  meaning,  and  is  constantly 
used  to  dispel  and  defeat  by  its  chime  the  influences 
of  evil.  How  often,  in  summers  spent  near  Siena,  I 
have  heard,  as  the  hail  clouds  darkened  over  the 
Chianti,  church  after  church  take  up  the  flying  peal, 
ringing  to  break  the  cloud  and  avert  the  danger  ! 
The  direct,  unmistakable  claim  of  the  church-bells 
themselves,  the  fnlgiira  fraiigo  so  often  fused  with 
them  as  a  bell-inscription,  shows  that  in  no  secondary 
sense  as  a  call  to  prayer,  but  in  itself,  the  sound  of 
the  bell  is  relied  on  as  a  true  defence.  Nor  is  any 
ritual  consecration  by  the  Church  thought  necessary 
to  secure  this  effect.  In  the  days  of  danger,  between 
Christmas  and  Epiphany  at  the  opening  of  the  year,^ 
I  have  met  in  a  Tuscan  country  town  masked  dancers 
in  white,  ringing  bells  at  nightfall  in  the  principal 
street.  And  these  were  precisely  horse-bells  which 
the  maskers  had  hung  about  their  necks,  strap  and  all, 
just  as  they  came  from  the  harness.  It  would  seem, 
in  fact,  that  what  brightness  and  colour  are  trusted 
to  do  by  day  is  secured  b}-  night  when  the  bells  are 
heard  ;  the  baroccio  and  its  driver  travel  safely  in  the 
darkness  under  cover  of  that  cheerful  chime. 

^  C.  G.  Leland,  Etruscan  Rei)iaiits  (London  :   Unwin,  1892),  p.  357. 
^  See  below,  p.  304. 


2  68  Florence  Past  and  Present 

The  fox-tail  and  badger  fur  found  among  the 
Tuscan  horse  trappings  may  be  treated  as  belonging 
to  a  distinct,  though  alHed,  department  of  the  same 
defensive  magic.  For  defence  ma}-  be  indirect,  and 
like  the  physician's  tonic,  may  help  by  conferring 
strength  to  meet  and  defeat  danger,  no  less  than 
by  averting  its  onset ;  the  antiseptic  is  not  the  only 
possible  treatment.  Tonic  magic  depends  on  a 
theory  of  transference,  and  under  it  valuable  qualities 
of  strength  or  subtlety  are  supposed  to  pass  from 
their  natural  possessors  to  the  man  who  knows  the 
secret.  Sometimes  the  practice  consists  in  eating 
the  flesh  of  the  animal  whose  powers  seem  desirable  ; 
sometimes  the  mere  wearing  of  its  spoils  is  thought 
enough  to  secure  the  result.  Thus  beaters  in  the 
Indian  jungle  will  often  beg  the  claws  or  whiskers 
of  the  dead  tiger  from  the  hunter  that  has  killed  it 
because  they  wish  to  wear  them  as  amulets.  In  the 
case  before  us  there  are  several  animals  in  question  ; 
the  fox,  the  badger,  and — one  may  add — the  boar 
and  the  serpent ;  all  of  them  distinguished  by  a 
mixture  of  strength  and  cunning  which  men  have 
always  admired  and  coveted.  The  fox  and  the 
serpent  have  become  proverbial  in  this  matter,  but 
swine,  according  to  Pliny,  have  the  advantage  even 
over  snakes,  and  devour  them  greedily  in  spite  of 
their  poison.^     As   to  the  badger,  the  same  author 

^  N.H.,  xi.  53.  So  the  hams  of  Montanches  in  Spain  are  said  to  be 
finer  than  others,  because  there  the  swine  find  vipers  to  eat.  See 
Ford's  Guide  (1S55),  P.  n.,  p.  489. 


Amulets  269 

says  he  is  not  less  wily  tiian  strong  ;  '  badgers  show 
another  skill  when  threatened  ;  inflating  their  skin 
they  airily  defeat  the  jaws  and  blows  of  dogs  and 
men."  ^  Thus  the  probability  is  that,  in  borrowing 
the  form  of  the  serpent  for  the  pommel  of  his  saddle, 
and  the  boar's  tusk,  the  fox's  tail,  and  the  badger's 
fur  for  the  further  decoration  of  the  harness,  the 
carter  repeats  to-day  the  old  magic.  Safety,  it  was 
once  thought,  and  sure  escape  from  danger  might 
be  had  in  this  close  association  with  such  typical 
examples  of  wisdom  and  of  strength. 

So  men  may  once  have  fancied,  but  this  theory 
of  protective  magic  must  be  sharply  distinguished 
from  its  practice,  and  is  not  at  all  necessary  to  the 
matter  in  hand.  Whatever  we  may  think  of  such 
an  explanation,  the  fact  remains  that  most,  if  not  all, 
of  the  harness  ornaments  just  described  are  actually 
used  as  personal  amulets  to-day  in  one  or  other 
Italian  province.  This  has  been  already  established 
as  regards  the  eye  itself,  the  plait,  and  the  bell,  nor 
is  present  superstitious  practice  less  doubtful  in  the 
case  of  the  rest.  The  mirror  not  only  draws  the 
'  eye,'  but  directly  opposes  and  defeats  its  fascina- 
tion '  par  endardement  reciproque.'  -  The  boar's 
tusk  is  often  found  set  in  silver  and  worn  for  a  like 
purpose.^     The    same  ma\'  be   said    of  the  badger's 

1  N.H.,   viii.   38.     See  a  curious  modern  instance  of  the  badger's 
cunning   as   reported    in   the  weekly  Spectator   for   March    12,   19 10, 

P-  415- 

-  Leland,  op.  cit.,  p.  93.  ^  Belhicci,  op.  cit.,  p.  35. 


270 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


hair.i  In  a  jeweller's  shop  at  the  Forum  of  Trajan 
in  Rome,  I  found  on  sale,  some  years  since,  tassels 
of  this  hair  set  in  silver  for  the  watch  chain :  they 
were  said  to  be  useful  against  the  evil  eye.  The 
serpent    is    a    common     charm.       Paired    as    for    a 


1  HK    ChMARU  J  A 


caduceus,  it  has  been  found  cut  in  bone  at  Siena.- 
I  have  an  example  of  the  cii/ianita,  the  compound 
amulet  worn  by  children  at  Naples  ;  where  the  serpent 
appears  enfolding  in  its  coils  the  crescent  moon  ;  ^ 
and  these  are  just  the  twin  symbols  of  the  mother 
goddess   which    so   often    appear,  separately   indeed 

'  Bellucci,  op.  cit.,  pp.  41,  47.  -  Elwoithy,  op.  cii.,  p.  316. 

•'//;/</.,  p.  345. 


Amulets  271 

yet  distinctly,  in  the  brasses  of  the  pommel  at 
Florence.  With  regard  to  the  whole,  it  may  surely 
be  said  that  such  correspondences  strengthen  each 
other,  and  that  the  theory  which  would  regard  the 
Tuscan  harness  ornaments  as  amulets  against  fascina- 
tion— whatever  may  have  been  the  underlying  reason 
for  this  use — has  been  fairly  made  out. 

At  this  point  a  natural  question  occurs :  why 
such  fear  for  the  team,  prompting  such  elaborate  and 
multiplied  means  of  protection?  If  we  are  right, 
those  who  devised  it  must  have  travelled  the  road 
in  a  constant  superstitious  terror  of  foes  unseen. 
What  time  then,  and  what  circumstance,  can  have 
given  rise  to  such  an  obsession  ? 

It  will  be  found  that,  to  recover  the  natural  facts 
here,  it  is  necessary  to  go  back  to  the  days  when 
the  woodmen  and  hunters  of  Tuscany  first  changed 
their  life  and  took  to  the  new  business  of  trade. 
This  change  occurred  under  pressure  of  necessity, 
and  it  is  therefore  probable  that  it  was  gradual,  and 
did  not  at  once  affect  the  whole  population.  The 
game,  which  could  no  longer  support  a  nation,  was 
still  plentiful  enough  to  feed  many.  Some,  the  more 
progressive  and  adaptable,  would  become  traders,  the 
rest  in  diminishing  number  would  long  follow  in 
the  woods  what  had  once  been  the  life  of  the  whole 
people. 

Yet  even  the  hunter  who  remained  such  could  not 
be  just  what  he  was  before  trade  came  his  way  and 


272  Florence  Past  and  Present 

claimed  part  of  his  kin.  A  contrast  was  now  forced 
on  his  attention  ;  that  between  the  old  life  to  which 
he  still  clung  and  the  new  that  was  moving  near 
him  on  the  widening  road.  Comparison  too  was 
inevitable ;  the  trader  was  in  the  van  of  human 
progress,  and,  as  he  profited  in  the  new  venture,  his 
neighbour  of  the  old  way  must  often  have  been  stung 
to  envy.  We  have  thought  already  of  the  woodland 
life,  and  can  understand  therefore  how  every  re- 
curring period  of  scarcity  would  sharpen  the  hunter's 
feelings  as  he  saw  the  comparative  regularity  of 
trade,  and  the  steady  supply  of  the  necessities  and 
even  the  luxuries  of  life  it  had  begun  to  ensure. 
One  or  other  of  two  results  was  inevitable.  Some 
would  leave  their  hunting,  tempted  by  what  they 
saw  of  trading  success.  The  rest,  to  whom  for  one 
reason  or  other  this  escape  was  closed,  would  act, 
at  least  occasionally,  under  impulse  of  their  envy, 
turning  to  the  caccia  grossa,  the  pursuit  of  their 
fellow  men,  and  so  becoming  the  terror  of  the 
road.  Hunters  of  wild  game  for  the  most  part  as 
their  fathers  had  been,  they  would  now,  especially 
when  game  was  scarce,  and  hunger  pressed,  occa- 
sionally prey  on  the  passing  trader  to  possess  them- 
selves of  his  tempting  load  of  Lombard  grain  or 
Latin  cheese.  Thus  the  bow  and  arrow,  the  sling 
and  the  skilful  ambush,  had  a  new  value  for  the 
enterprising  hunter,  and  the  woods  and  hills  through 
whicli  his  way  wound,  and  the  night  that  darkened 


Amulets  273 

over  it  as  the  sun  set,  a  definite  terror  and  undeniable 
danger  for  the  Tuscan  trader.  To  meet  this  he 
organised  his  caravan,  and,  travelling  in  numbers, 
resumed  the  woodland  weapons  of  his  fathers  as  the 
instruments  of  a  new  defence  against  their  direct 
successors. 

Thus  the  trader  found  himself  in  a  new  situation  ; 
enmity  had  grown  up  between  him  and  the  kind  from 
which  he  came,  while  ever}'  reason  of  interest 
begotten  of  continued  contact  and  intimacy  allied  him 
rather  to  the  pastoral  and  agricultural  populations, 
his  neighbours  on  either  side,  with  whom  he  dealt. 
The  result  must  have  been  that  he  began  to  think  of 
the  men  of  the  forest  as  an  outsider  would,  and  to 
adopt  in  this  matter  the  opinions  of  his  new  allies,  the 
shepherd  and  the  farmer.  What  these  opinions  were 
we  have  already  seen.  To  the  dwellers  in  the  open 
plains  of  the  north  or  south  the  woods  that  intervened 
were  a  wild  and  mysterious  place,  and  the  forest 
people  skilled  in  a  strange  sorcery  of  their  own. 
These  knew  the  language  of  the  beasts  and  birds,  the 
secret  of  the  plants,  and  how  to  use  a  footprint,  or 
some  least  rag  of  dress,  with  fatal  force  against  the 
careless  intruder  on  their  preserves.  We  may  be  sure 
that  strange  tales  were  told  round  the  evening  fires  in 
Lombardy  and  Latium  ;  that  facts  lost  nothing  in  the 
telling,  and  that  of  such  natural  exaggeration  was 
easily  born  a  firm  belief  in  the  truth  of  the  woodland 
magic. 

S 


2  74  Florence  Past  and  Present 

This  then  was  the  superstition  to  which  the  trader 
succeeded  in  his  separation  from  his  own  kin  and  his 
association  with  those  who  first  conceived  it.  Nay, 
one  may  fancy  that  his  own  experience  may  well  have 
led  him  to  contribute  a  new  element  to  the  growing 
body  of  magical  doctrine.  He  sadly  knew  the  skill 
with  which  the  hunter  could  waylay  him,  and  set  an 
ambush  in  the  woods  for  his  passing  caravan  ;  the 
sure  aim  of  the  silent  death  that  smote  man  or  beast 
from  the  thicket.  Yet  so,  the  eye  was  everything 
here ;  the  eye,  that  aimed  arrow,  spear,  or  sling-stone 
with  such  diabolical  precision.  His  own  was  nothing 
to  it,  for  in  becoming  a  trader  he  had  lost  much  of  the 
old  skill  that  his  enemy  still  preserved  by  daily 
practice.  Rather  than  acknowledge  his  natural 
inferiority  he  would  exaggerate  the  forces  he  must 
meet  (jn  the  trade  route.  Strange  powers,  he  begins 
to  suspect  and  to  protest,  are  leagued  against  him. 
The  envy  that  directs  the  aim  may  act  of  itself  even 
in  the  absence  of  arrow,  dart,  or  stone  ;  the  eye  of  the 
envious  is  itself  a  fatal  engine  fit  to  project  death 
where  it  fixes  its  terrible  glance.  Jettatura  is  still  the 
word  for  such  fascination,  and  in  what  it  involves,  of 
direction  and  projection,  it  points  to  the  original  idea 
that  gave  rise  to  the  superstition  of  the  evil  eye. 

So  the  amulet  follows  as  a  natural  consequence  of 
such  belief  and  fear.  If  the  arrow,  the  dart,  and  the 
sling-stone  are  not  all,  if  the  envious  eye  that  aims 
these  is  able  of  itself  to  work  mischief,  tlie  caravan 


Amulets  275 

must  find  a  corresponding  defence.  It  will  travel  the 
roads,  then,  not  only  armed  in  the  ordinary  sense,  but 
protected,  horse  and  man  together,  by  whatever  may 
serve  to  defeat  the  power  of  evil  fascination. 

Now  where  are  such  charms  to  be  found  7  The 
object  here  is  to  defeat  the  power  of  the  hunter,  and 
help  may  therefore  well  be  sought  in  amulets  derived 
from  the  animals  that  do,  in  fact,  most  often  escape 
his  toils.  The  fox,  the  boar,  and  the  badger  effect 
this  b}'  their  strength  or  cunning,  the  serpent  too 
because  he  is  slippery  and  poisonous,  and,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  these  animals  have  all,  as  we  know,  lent  either 
their  form  or  their  spoils  to  the  horse  harness.  In 
this  artificial  connection  magical  rapport  is  designed, 
in  the  plain  hope  that  such  escape  may  also  be  the 
good  fortune  of  the  travelling  merchant,  as  he  and  his 
team  run  the  gauntlet  of  the  hunter's  ambuscade. 

But  there  is  another  decoration  of  the  harness,  as 
yet  unnoticed,  which  seems  even  more  significant,  and 
which  lends  itself  to  a  like  interpretation.  The  tassels 
of  the  head-stall,  and  the  red  wool  hung  in  bunches 
from  the  standard  of  the  saddle  pommel,  both  tend  to 
take  the  form  of  balls  which,  in  form,  size,  and  colour 
alike,  mimic  very  exactly  the  bright  yellow  or  red 
fruit  of  the  arbutus  :  the  corbcz::olc  seen  on  every 
Florentine  fruit-stall  in  the  later  autumn.  If  this  also 
be  an  amulet,  and  if  the  resemblance  we  have  traced  be 
intentional,  defence  is  again  sought  from  the  woods  as 
before,  though  its  secret  now  lies  not  in  the  wild  life 


276  Florence  Past  and  Present 

they  shelter  but  in  the  trees  themselves.  What 
thought  can  have  prompted  such  a  belief  and  such  an 
artifice  ? 

One  thing  is  plain,  that  antiquity  recognised  in  the 
arbutus  the  power  of  averting  evil  influences.  Ovid, 
speaking  of  the  nymph  Cardea,  says  : — 

'  Protinus  arbutca  postes  ter  in  ordine  tangit 
Fronde,  ter  arbutea  limina  fronde  notat  '  ;  ' 

and  as  the  same  poet  introduces  Cardea  as  the 
protegee  of  Janus,  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  the 
arbutus,  thus  applied  to  the  door,  must  share  with 
the  white-thorn  the  prophylactic  virtue  supposed  to 
reside  in  the  virga  Jaiialis.  It  is  no  modern  fancy 
then,  but  an  ancient  tradition  and  use,  that  we  must 
try  to  understand. 

Far  behind  Roman  times,  the  worship  of  trees  was 
commonly  practised  in  Italy  as  in  ever\'  other  land 
where  they  grow.  This  cult  depended,  of  course,  on 
the  belief  that  the  tree  harboured  a  spiritual  presence, 
which  might  indeed  be  evil  if  neglected  or  offended, 
but  which,  duly  regarded  and  called  forth,  was  ready 
to  help  man  in  his  need.  Now  there  is  no  natural 
fact  so  likely  to  have  suggested  this  superstition  as 
that  which  comes  under  man's  notice  with  the  dis- 
covery of  fire.  For  fire  can  be  rubbed  from  wood 
almost  as  easily  as  it  is  struck  from  flint,  and  as  the 
latter  process  suggests  the  worship  of  stones,  so  the 

^  Faiti,  vi.   155-6. 


Amulets  277 

former  may  probably  have  begot  the  cult  of  the 
corresponding  stock — the  tree — not  less  evidently 
the  dwelling-place  of  this  power,  bright,  mysterious 
and  helpful  to  man  ;  only  waiting  his  summons  to 
appear  and  to  do  him  good.  From  the  cold  and 
darkness  of  the  night,  from  the  wild  beasts  seeking 
their  prey,  man  sat  safe  in  the  sacred  circle  of  the 
hearth.  No  wonder  he  worshipped  the  tree  as  the 
dwelling-place  of  that  protective  power. 

There  were  some  trees  too  which  seemed  to  claim 
this  reverence  in  a  higher  degree  than  the  rest,  as 
putting  forth  visible  signs  of  the  indwelling  fire.  It 
is  probably  for  this  reason  that  trees  bearing  bright 
red  fruit  have  always  had  a  certain  magic  importance. 
Thus  the  rowan  of  the  north  has  served  in  many  a 
spell ;  one  may  believe  the  reason  lies  in  the  colour 
it  shows  in  autumn.  So  too  in  spring  the  same 
colour  appears  with  the  fresh  shoots  of  the  oak — 
noticed  there  by  Chaucer — and  in  the  buds  of  certain 
kinds  of  ash.  The  mystic  fame  of  the  oak  is  too 
plain  to  need  proof,  and  as  to  the  other,  it  used  to  be 
said  in  Oldenburg  that  ash-trees  lost  their  red  buds 
before  midsummer  because  the  witches  ate  them  up 
on  their  way  to  the  Sabbat  lest  the  power  of  the 
beneficent  tree  should  be  used  against  them.^  In 
our  own  Forest  of  Dean,  the  '  King  o'  the  Rose,'  the 
rough  red  rose-gall,  was  used  as  a  charm.-     It  would 

'  R.  Folkard,  Plant  Lore  (London,  1884),  p.  96. 
-  Folk  Lore,  xiii.  (June,  1902),  p.  173. 


lyS  Florence  Past  and  Present 

seem,  indeed,  that  just  as  the  flag  on  the  castle  is  a 
sign  of  residence  and  of  power,  so  this  colour  on  bush 
or  tree  was  taken  as  a  proof  that,  where  it  showed, 
there  men  should  recognise  and  pay  court  to  the 
spirit  of  the  woods  and  of  indwelling  fire. 

Now  by  its  rough  and  brilliant  fruit,  yellow  that 
changes  to  fiery  red  in  ripening,  the  arbutus  plainly 
belongs  to  this  mystic  order ;  the  fire-trees  that  have 
furnished  men  with  so  many  protective  charms.  One 
is  not  surprised  then  to  find  that  the  Greeks  called 
this  tree  by  a  name  which  means  a  brazier,  and  is 
derived  from  the  word  for  a  burning  coal ;  ^  or  that 
the  Latins  knew  it  as  a  defence  against  the  powers 
of  evil.  The  Latin  name  for  the  arbutus — iinedo — 
must  have  some  meaning  other  than  the  trivial 
explanation  of  Pliny  would  suggest.-  May  it  not, 
one  asks,  preserve  that  of  Uni,  the  Etruscan  Juno? 
Thus  Aid  or  Janus  would  hand  on  to  Cardea  only 
what  he  had  himself  received  from  Uni,  and,  in 
goddess  and  nymph  alike,  would  appear  something 
of  their  original  ;  the  mother-goddess  discovered  in 
the  grove,  the  tree-mother,  propitious  to  woodland 
men. 

The  amulet  from  a  fire-tree  might  be,  and  no 
doubt  often  was,  simple  and  direct ;  the  branch  with 
its  colour,  plucked  and  worn  as  a  protective  charm. 
But  spring  and  autumn  pass  ;  trees  are  not  always 
budding  or  bearing  their  fruit,  and  therefore  art  must 

^  di'5/)dxX'?  from  dvdpa^.  -  N.//.,  xv.  24. 


Amulets  279 

supplement  nature  if  the  protection  they  seem  to 
promise  is  to  be  always  available.  The  art  here  was 
that  of  imitation,  which  replaced  the  natural  red  by 
the  corresponding  colour  in  dyed  wool.  Thus,  in  the 
north,  branches  of  the  rowan  were  bound  to  the 
horns  of  the  herd  with  red  wool  to  disarm  the  evil 
eye ;  ^  the  wool  replacing  the  scarlet  berry  char- 
acteristic of  the  tree.  A  development  of  the  same 
device  is  seen  at  Florence  in  the  habit  of  binding  red 
threads  about  pots  of  rue  to  complete  their  charm. 
Here  art  no  longer  imitates  nature,  but  assumes  a 
power  of  its  own,  fit,  it  is  thought,  to  reinforce  what 
nature  supplies.  Midwa\'  between  these  two  comes 
the  case  of  the  Florentine  harness  with  its  balls  of 
red  wool.  As  with  the  rue,  art  here  stands  alone  ; 
able  of  itself  to  provide  an  amulet  without  help  from 
nature.  Yet  the  art  of  these  nappe  is  imitative  as 
no  mere  thread  or  binding  can  be,  and  what  it 
presents  is  the  fruit  of  the  fire-tree,  the  sacred  arbutus 
that  protects  from  evil  fascination. 

Evidently  the  whole  matter  rests  here,  in  the 
imitation  we  have  supposed,  and  therefore  nothing, 
however  trivial,  must  be  neglected  which  tends  in  the 
least  to  show  that  there  is  a  known  connection 
between  the  arbutus  and  the  cart  of  the  Tuscan 
roads.     The  authorit}'  already  more  than  once  quoted 

'  The  popular  rhyme  runs  : — 

'  Rowan  tree  and  red  thread 
Will  drive  the  witches  a'  wud.' 


28o  Florence  Past  and  Present 

in  this  chapter  gives  a  traditional  version,  apparently 
current  still  at  Florence,  of  the  story  of  Cardea.^  In 
it  the  main  elements  of  Ovid's  tale  are  all  present : 
the  pining  child,  the  witch  that  brings  the  evil,  and 
the  arbutus  berries  that  act  as  a  counter-charm,  but 
the  white-witch,  or  good  fairy,  that  uses  the  arbutus 
to  cure  the  child  is  no  longer  Cardea  but  Carradora  ; 
as  it  were  the  preserver  of  the  cart  and  its  team,  just 
as  the  Carradore  is  the  cart-maker.-  Suppose  this 
name  a  pure  invention  ;  yet  it  could  only  occur  to 
one  who  had  seen  in  the  harness  tassels  a  direct 
imitation  of  the  arbutus  berries  they  so  much  resemble. 
We  may  take  it  then  that  this  is  the  traditional 
Florentine  way  of  looking  at  these  details,  and  that 
they  were  meant  to  protect  the  team  as  representing 
the  fruit  of  a  tree  peculiarly  sacred  to  the  mother  of 
the  woods. 

Thus  the  present  decoration  of  the  Florentine 
harness  is  derived  from  a  past  that  lies  beyond  the 
reach  of  history.  Its  many  amulets  date  from  the 
time  when  the  hunter  became  the  trader  on  the  first 
cross-country  roads.  This  at  least  was  the  moment 
when  their  application  to  the  horse  seemed  necessary, 
but  they  themselves,  or  many  of  them,  derive  from  a 
past  still  more  remote.  The  change  that  put  enmity 
between  the  trader  and  his  kin  who  still  followed  the 
chase  could  not  entirely  cut  him  off  from  his  inheri- 

'  C.  G.  Leland,  Etruscan  Komaii  Kcinaiiis,  pp.  107-9. 
-  See  above,  p.  238. 


Amulets  281 

tance.  He,  as  well  as  they,  came  from  the  forest,  and 
when  he  sought  protection  from  what  were  still  forest- 
fears,  the  amulets  he  chose  were  such  as  the  ancient 
beliefs  of  the  race  pointed  to  ;  they  represented  the 
magic  learned  in  the  woods  by  the  common  ancestors 
of  a  people  that  the  coming  of  trade  had  so  sharply 
divided.  Among  all  Florentine  survivals  there  is 
none  perhaps  so  distinct  and  remarkable  as  this  ; 
which,  under  colour  of  mere  ornament,  and  by 
obstinate  tradition  rather  than  living  superstition — 
though  superstition  is  not  dead — preserves  in  the 
cart  harness  to-day  a  witness  to  the  thoughts,  the 
fears,  and  the  hopes  of  remotest  time. 


Ill 

THE    FEASTS 


CHAPTER   XII 

CEPPO   AND   PEFANA 

Christmas  at  Florence,  as  elsewhere,  is  the  season 
when  presents  are  made  by  persons  of  means  to  their 
servants,  tradesmen,  and  dependants  of  every  kind. 
These  '  boxes,'  as  we  call  them,  are  known  in 
Tuscany  as  ceppi  or  '  logs,'  and  the  name  shows  that 
the  Yule-log  is  a  reality  here,  far  deeper  and  more 
ancient  than  the  show  of  seasonable  holly  and 
mistletoe  laid  out  for  the  foreigner  on  the  Lung'  Arno 
would  lead  one  to  suspect.  These  greens  are  a  dis- 
play unknown  till  recent  years,  but  the  Ceppo  is  an 
ancient  local  usage  which  deserves  consideration. 

The  name  of  the  Ceppo  is  derived,  almost  without 
change,  from  the  Latin  cippiis,  the  tree-trunk,  and  the 
log  was  great  indeed  which  used  to  burn  on  every 
Tuscan  hearth  as  each  24th  of  December  came  round. 
Boccaccio,  condescending  for  a  moment  from  mytho- 
logy to  describe  the  habits  of  his  own  country  and 
people,  tells  what  was  done  at  Christmas  in  Florence  : 
how  the  house-father  laid  the  great  log  on  the  Lari, 
as  the  fire-dogs  of  the  hearth  were  called  in  his  day  ; 

286 


2  86  Florence  Past  and  Present 

how  the  family  gathered  about  it,  while  their  head 
called  for  wine,  drank,  and  poured  a  libation  from  his 
cup  on  the  glowing  wood,  after  which  the  others 
drank  in  turn  as  the  cup  went  round. ^  Later 
authorities  enable  us  to  complete  the  scene,  telling 
how  the  log  was  beaten  to  make  the  sparks  fly  up  the 
chimney,  and  that  the  Florentines  liked  it  large,  so 
that  when  kindled  it  might  burn  long,  even  for  days, 
without  going  out.- 

Here  then  are  all  the  signs  which  show  the 
antiquity  of  a  rite.  The  house  itself,  without  further 
consecration  than  the  presence  there  of  the  family,  is 
the  temple  ;  the  hearth  the  altar,  and  the  father  the 
priest.  The  Lari,  or  fire-dogs,  are  the  Dii  Lares  of 
Roman  household  religion.  The  ccppo  itself  is  a  true 
and  huge  tree-trunk  ;  it  must  be  so  if,  as  we  shall 
presently  see,  it  is  to  burn  continuously  for  twelve 
days.  One  thinks  of  it  as  set  on  end,  reaching  high 
in  the  chimney  and  sinking  gradually  to  the  hearth 
day  by  day  as  it  burns  awa\'  from  the  root.  Thus, 
behind  Roman  religion,  we  find  what  preceded  it. 
The  Ceppo  is  a  yearl}-  return  to  the  original  life  of  the 
woods,  when  the  hunter's  fire  smouldered  from  day  to 
day  in  the  root  of  the  standing  tree,  and  when  that 
hearth,  blown  betimes  to  a  leaping  flame,  gathered 
about  it  all  the  mystery  and  comfort  that  might 
belong  to  forest  nights  in  winter  :  their  encompassing 

^  G.  lioccaccio,  Gcucaloi^ia  dc  ii!t  Dei  {XcncUa.,  1564),  p.  204. 
^  See  the  Kiiiic  uf  Fayiuoli,  and  I'ilre,  Archh'io,  xii.  205. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  287 

fear  and  its  sure,  if  narrow  remedy.  What  we  know 
of  how  this  primitive  religion  developed  in  the 
definite  worship  of  the  Lares  shows  that  the  libation 
of  wine  at  Ceppo,  still  used  at  Florence  in  the 
fourteenth  century  if  no  later,  represents  an  offering 
.to  the  spirits  of  darkness  and  of  the  underworld  ; 
perhaps  to  those  of  the  dead. 

From  Florence  to  Greece  is  a  step  we  have  already 
found  natural  ;  it  is  Greece  rather  than  Rome  that  is 
likely  to  throw  light  on  Florentine  peculiarities,  and 
therefore  on  the  Ceppo  and  its  real  meaning.  The 
Ceppo  is  still  a  Greek  usage,  and  is  found  in  the  very 
form  we  have  supposed  likel}'  :  that  of  a  long  log 
reaching  up  the  chimney  and  burning  gradually  from 
the  lower  end.^  The  reason  given  for  the  practice  is 
that  the  chimney  is  the  place  where  evil  dwells,  or  at 
least  the  passage  b)-  which  it  may  enter  the  house 
to  work  mischief,  and  Greek  fancy  has  been  busy  in 
giving  this  dread  a  definite  form  ;  dividing,  classing, 
and  naming  the  enemies  it  fears.  Children  born 
between  December  25th  and  January  6th  are  called 
'feast-stricken '  or  possessed  of  a  devil. '-^  The  evil  spirit 
may,  it  is  thought,  materialise  in  one  or  other  of  three 
forms;  as  a  callicantzaros^  a  werewolf,  or  a  vampire; 
all  more  or  less  connected  and  interchangeable. 
The  first  is  a  bestial  demon,  shaggy,  black,  and  wild, 
in  whose  name  some  vestige  has  been  found  of  the 

'  J.  C.  Lawson,  Modern  Greek  Folk-Lore  (Cambridge,  1910),  p.  200. 
-  eopTOTTido'fj.ara,  ibid.,  p.  20S. 


288  Florence  Past  and  Present 

classic  centaur.  The  second  is  at  once  more  and 
less  human  :  a  man  who  can  change  himself  into  a 
wolf  at  will,  and  work  death  as  such.  The  third, 
and  most  dreadful  of  all,  is  a  human  corpse  possessed 
by  an  evil  spirit  which  drives  it  from  the  grave  to 
make  havoc  among  the  living. 

Against  these  horrors  the  Greek  uses  fire  as  the 
first  remedy.  Children  suspected  of  the  fatal  birth- 
gift  have  the  soles  of  their  feet  burnt,  or  are  roasted 
in  a  hot  oven  to  drive  out  the  spirit  that  would  make 
them  wolves  by  night.^  The  corpse  found  in  an 
unnatural  fullness  and  freshness  is  consumed  by  fire 
lest  it  should  work  mischief  as  a  vampire.-  The 
yule-log  is  set  in  the  chimney  and  kept  burning  all 
the  twelve  days  of  danger  against  any  entry  by  that 
dark  road,  and  especially  against  the  coming  and 
attempts  of  the  ca/licantzaros,  the  black  and  evil 
horseman.-^  Handfuls  of  herbs  and  other  matters 
are  thrown  too  from  time  to  time  on  the  fire  to  make 
it  crackle,  just  as  the  log  is  beaten  in  Tuscany  that 
it  may  sparkle  ;  a  warning  then,  in  either  case,  that 
the  flaming  sword  has  been  set  in  the  chimney,  and 
an  assurance  that  the  house  is  safe.'*  Torches  are 
waved  outside  for  the  same  reason,  and  the  whole 
is  an  evident  development,  wherein  the  ancient  forest 
fears  are  still  recognisable  under  their  altered  shapes, 
and  the  natural  forest  defence,  the  fire,  reappears  in 

'  Lawson,  op.  cit.  "  //;/(/.,  pp.  374,  411,  488. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  200.  "*  //;/(/.,  pp.  201-2. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  289 

its  old  use  and  almost  in  its  primitive  form.  On  this 
Tuscany  and  Greece  are  agreed,  and  even  share  the 
custom  which  adds  noise  of  all  kinds  to  fire  as  a 
means  of  dispelling  evil.^  At  Florence  such  noise  is 
peculiar  to  the  close  of  the  fatal  period,  and  dis- 
tinguishes the  feast  of  the  Befana,  which,  though 
it  belongs  to  the  same  order  of  things  as  Ceppo, 
may  well,  when  we  reach  it,  open  a  new  view  of  the 
'  twelve  days  '  its  timel)'  clamour  brings  to  a  close. 

An  ancient  inscription  shows  that  in  Fiesole  it 
not  in  Florence,  a  society  was  early  formed  to 
promote  the  Roman  observance  of  the  Coinpitaliar 
This  was  a  movable  feast,  but  it  always  fell  in  the 
opening  da\-s  of  the  year,  and  came  to  be  generally 
held  between  the  second  and  the  sixth  of  January  ; 
days  noted  in  the  calendar  as  of  evil  omen.^  It  thus 
corresponds  with  the  period  we  are  studying,  and 
there  is  the  more  reason  to  seek  light  from  the 
Compitalia  that  it  is  said  to  have  been  instituted  by 
a  Tuscan — Servius  Tullius — who  may  be  supposed 
to  have  embodied  in  this  feast  the  customs  of  his 
own  country  and  race.^  It  is  to  be  noted  too  that 
Servius  Tullius  was  said  to  have  been  the  son  of 
a  hill-girl '' — Ocrisia — by  a  spark  from  the  hearth, 
or   domestic  Lar ;  '^    a    paternity    which    agrees    well 

'  Lawson,  op.  n't.,  pp.  224-30.  -  C.I L.,  xi.  i.  1550. 

^  Fowler,  op.  cit.,  pp.  279-80.  •*  Ibid.,  op.  cit.,  p.  171. 

^  E.  Pais,  Ancient  Italy  (Chicago,  1908),  p.  1 13,  note. 
"  Pliny,  N.H.,  xxxvi.  27.     There  is  a  Scottish  tale  of  the  same  kind 
which  makes  the  father  of  the  child  an  ancestral  spirit. 

T 


290  Florence  Past  and  Present 

with    the     rehgioLis     character     of     the      feast      he 
introduced. 

The  CompitaHa  then,  as  one  would  expect,  was 
the  feast  of  the  Lares,  and  in  a  special  sense  of  their 
mother  Mania,  the  ancient  and  terrible  Larva,  whose 
name  nurses  used  to  frighten  children  ;  just  as  the 
Befana  is  the  bugbear  of  Tuscany  to-day.  But  in 
the  old  time  these  fears  had  a  sad  foundation  in  fact, 
for  time  was  when  children  were  offered  up  at  the 
feast  as  a  sacrifice  to  secure  the  peace  of  the  family. 
Later,  these  sacrifices  were  replaced  by  images  of 
wool  or  wax  called  Maniac.  These  were  hung  at  the 
house  door,  one  for  each  soul  in  the  house.^  At  the 
cross-roads — ihe^Compita  from  which  the  feast  had 
its  name — the  Lares  were  set  up  and  honoured  by 
the  shed  blood  of  a  dog  :  a  rare  sacrifice  which  they 
shared  with  Proserj^ine,  the  infernal  Ceres,  goddess 
of  the  shades  and  of  the  underworld.  The  purpose 
of  the  rite  is  stated  to  be  propitiation  ;  lest  any  one 
should  become  manes,  and  with  this  view  it  was 
offered  to  Genita  Mana.-'  It  will  be  seen  how  this 
corresponds  with  the  Greek  fear  for  children  born 
during  the  fatal  period,  and  what  reason  therefore 
there  is  to  suppose  that  the  ancient  niancs  survives 
in  the  adjective  of  the  Tuscan  name  hipo  n/annaro. 
What  men  feared  then,  as  now,  was  that  their 
children  should  be  ])ossesscd   from  birth,  and   should 

^  Macrob.,  Sa/.,  i.  7- 

-  Plut.,  Q.A'.,  Hi.  cxi.  Sec  also  Darenibcrg  et  Saglio,  Diction- 
naire,  s. v.  'Manes,  Mania.' 


Ceppo  and  Befana  291 

grow  up  the  victims  of  a  fatal  lycanthropy.  For 
this  at  least  of  the  old  fears  lives  in  Tuscany  to-day, 
and  to  such  purpose  that,  in  the  gci'go,  mannara  has 
survived  as  the  slang  word  for  a  festival  of  any 
kind  ;  ^  as  if  the  day  sacred  to  Mania  had  left  an 
impression  in  Italy  never  to  be  effaced. 

That  the  dog  was  sacrificed  to  Mania  and  to  Pro- 
serpine alike,  is  not  the  only  reason  why  these  two 
names  should  appear  together  in  this  chapter.  Many 
details  occur  at  this  season,  and  in  its  rites,  which 
suggest  that  the  two  goddesses  are  substantially  one  ; 
being  only  different  aspects  of  the  same  chthonic 
power.  The  time  of  the  Compitalia  is  appropriate  to 
Proserpine,  for  it  is  the  season  of  deep  winter,  when 
the  corn  lies  buried  in  the  earth.  Dalmatia,  the  half- 
way house  between  Florence  and  Greece,  still  adds 
grain  to  the  Florentine  libation,  scattering  it  on  the 
burning  Yule-log.-  Pork,  the  flesh  of  the  animal 
which  the  ancients  gave  to  Demeter  and  her  daughter, 
is  laid  out  in  Greece  during  the  twelve  days  as  an 
offering  to  the  Callicantzari.^  To  this  day,  in  Tuscany, 
if  you  wish  to  call  a  man  a  pig,  \'ou  may  sa\'  norciiio  ; 
a  derivative,  by  way  of  her  town  in  the  Umbrian 
hills,  of  that  Nortia,  the  Etruscan  alias  of  the  Roman 
Fortuna,  herself  a  corn-goddess,  to  whom  Servius 
Tullius    w^as    so    devoted."*     But,    as    we    ha\-e    seen, 

^  Mirabella,  Mala  Vila  (Napoli,  19 lo),  p.  347. 

"  F.   H.  Jackson,   Shores  of  Ihe  Adriatic  (London:   Murray,  1908) 
pp.  12-13. 

^  Lawson,  op.  cil.,  p.  209.  ^  Fowler,  op.  cil.,  p.  171, 


292  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Servius  set  up  the  Compitalia,  and  here  is  reason  to 
think  that  the  Mania  then  named  and  worshipped 
was  only  the  Fortune  of  the  harvest,  or  Nortia,  under 
another  name  ;  as  the  goddess  of  the  hidden  corn, 
and,  perchance,  of  other  buried  things  thought  of  with 
that,  and  feared  as  well  as  hoped  for  in  their  springing. 
It  is  in  strict  accordance  with  this  idea  that  the  feast 
of  the  Compitalia  was  chief!}'  observed  by  farm 
labourers,  who  hung  ox-\'okes  that  day  on  the  shrine 
of  Mania  and  the  Lares.^  The  ploughman's  wife  is 
still  the  LarcUa  in  Italian  gcrgo'^  and  even  now  in 
Tuscany  the  rhymed  prayer,  sung  by  children  while 
the  ccppo  burns,  closes  with  an  appeal  for  sunshine 
and  plenty  of  it  \-'  the  answering  heavenly  fire  to 
warm  the  earth  and  bring  the  buried  grain  to  hght 
and  fruitfulness.  For  the  25th  of  December  was  the 
Dies  Invicti  Solis,the  winter  solstice  according  to  the 
Julian  Calendar;  the  opening  of  a  period  of  danger 
when  the  sun,  new-born  and  still  weak,  might  seem  to 
need  helj)  in  meeting  and  mastering  the  cold  that 
grew  stronger  with  the  growing  day.  At  this  moment 
too  the  sun  stood  in  the  '  gate '  by  which  souls 
returned  from  earth  to  the  spirit  world."* 

Egypt  once  called  to  what  slept  in  her  fields  I\Iaa- 
ne-hra,  'come  tiiou  back  again,'  and,  lest  you  should 
think  she  had  onl)'  the  corn  in  mind,  w  rfite  the  mystic 

-  Fowler,  op.  rit.,  p.  279.  -  Mirabella,  op.  cit.,  p.  341. 

2  L.  Duff  Gordon,  Home  Life  in  Italy,  p.  314. 
*  See  Macrob.,  Somn.  Scip.,  i.  12. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  293 

appeal  in  that  Book  of  the  Dead  which  she  buried 
with  every  mummy.^  This  Maa-ne  is  possibly  the 
first  form  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  Mania,  and,  in 
any  case,  it  is  prett}-  sure  that  Mania  is  Demeter  or 
Proserpine ;  thought  of  more  speciall}-  in  relation 
with  human  death  and  burial,-  perhaps  with  human 
resurrection. 

A  like  connection  between  men  themselves  and 
the  corn  the\'  sow  appears,  one  must  think,  in  Venus, 
who  was  originally  a  corn-goddess,  the  alias  in  this 
respect  of  Demeter  and  Fortuna.^  For  man  thought 
himself  one  with  the  corn  in  life  as  well  as  in 
death,  and  believed  in  a  connection  between  his  own 
fruitfulness  and  that  of  his  fields.^  Balanced  evenly 
in  early  times,  this  regard  lost  its  first  meaning  and 
original  reverence  by  falling  more  and  more  on 
the  human  side  of  the  correspondence,  till  Venus 
became  what  we  find  her  in  the  literature  of  Greece 
and  of  Rome  ;  no  better  than  she  should  be.  She  is 
worth  notice  here  only  because  of  what  she  once 
meant,  and  as  leading  to  a  further  discovery  in  the 
strange  field  of  superstition  that  lies  between  the 
limits  of  Ceppo  and  the  Befana. 

The  wild  m}'th  of  the  black  Demeter  of  Phigalia 

'  Brugsch,  quoted  by  Frazer,  Golden  Bough,  ii.  p.  223  (2nd  ed.). 

-The  Athenians  called  their  dead  '  Demeter's  folk,'  Si]/x-qTpeioL. 
See  Plutarch,  quoted  by  Lawson,  o/>  cit.,  p.  579. 

•*  Fowler,  op.  cit.,  pp.  67,  68.  See  also,  on  relation  of  Venus  and 
Proserpine,  Macrob.,  Sat,,  i.  21. 

'  See  Frazer,  Golden  Bough,  ii.  pp.  205 -S. 


294  Florence  Past  and  Present 

with  a  human  body  but  the  head  of  a  horse,^  has  a 
gentler  parallel  in  that  of  Venus  Erycina.  Poseidon 
belongs  to  both,  though  in  Sicily  his  place  is  some- 
times taken  by  Butes.  In  the  one  case  he  becomes 
the  father  of  Hera,  in  the  other  of  Eryx.-  That 
Venus  Erycina  is  the  equivalent  of  Demeter  appears 
in  the  account  of  her  Sicilian  temple,  given  by  Aelian, 
who  says  a  perpetual  dew  fell  on  the  sacred  spot, 
causing  the  grass  to  grow  there  in  a  spring  that  every 
night  renewed.^  Originally  these  stories  came  from 
Arcadia,  where  the  goddess  was  called  Demeter  at 
Phigalia,  and  Venus  at  Psophis ;  a  neighbouring 
town,  which  had  its  name  from  that  Psophis,  daughter 
of  Eryx,  who  chose  the  site  and  built  the  temple  of 
Venus  Erycina  beside  the  river  Aroanius."*  Now  it 
was  the  town  of  Psophis  which  colonised  the  island  of 
Zacynthus,  and  gave  its  own  name  to  the  ancient 
citadel  there  ;  no  doubt  Zacynthus  shared  with  the 
mother  country  the  worship  of  this  verdant  Venus  of 
the  spring.  But  Zacynthus  in  its  turn  sent  out  a 
swarm  that  reached  and  founded  Saguntum  in  Spain. 
We    have   seen   the    probability    that   this    westward 

'  I'ausanias,  viii.  25,  42.  "  ApoUodoiiis,  3. 

■'  The  miraculous  picture  of  Custonaci  seems  to  assure  tliis  fact  ; 
continuing  today  the  memory,  if  not  the  cult,  of  Venus  Erycina  as  a 
corn-goddess.  The  picture  is  periodically  carried  to  Monte  San 
Giuliano — the  ancient  Eryx — for  worship.  It  shows  the  Madonna 
and  Cliild  holding  three  ears  of  corn.  See  G.  Pitre,  FfsiL'  Patronali 
in  Sicilia,  and  the  Corriere  della  Sera,  Milan,  16  August  191c. 

■*  For  the  Demeter  of  Phigalia  and  Venus  Erycina  at  Psophis,  see 
i'ausanias,  viii. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  295 

movement  may  have  touched,  and  for  a  time  held, 
the  valley  of  the  Arno,  and  new  proof  of  this 
temporary  settlement  is  now  at  hand.  The  Verruca 
of  Pisa  is,  even  etymologically,  the  Eryx  of  Psophis, 
and  of  Lilybceum.^  Near  b)'  is  the  village  of  Buti, 
and  from  their  hills  both  these  Tuscan  sites  look 
down  on  the  course  of  the  Arno,  as  Psophis  in 
Arcadia  does  on  the  Aroanius.  To  these  streams  we 
shall  }'et  return,  for  there  is  reason  to  think  then- 
names  embody  that  of  Arna,  the  alias  of  the  very 
Flora,  or  Venus,  we  are  discussing.  The  immediate 
question,  however,  rather  concerns  Phigalia  and  the 
black  Demeter.  If  she  too  appear  b}-  the  Arno,  the 
practical  identity  of  these  goddesses  may  be  held  for 
certain  ;  the  one  will  represent  the  winter,  the  other 
the  spring,  and  the  corn,  buried  or  sprouting,  will  be 
the  bond  of  union  between  them. 

The  horse  counts  for  much  in  the  Arcadian  myth. 
Poseidon  assumes  this  form  because  Demeter  alread)' 
has  it :  as  she  sits  in  her  cave  above  Phigalia  the 
moody  goddess  retains  her  horse's  head,  though  for 
the  rest  a  very  woman.  The  god  on  the  other  hand, 
though  his  images  express  a  human  form,  is 
worshipped  as  the  father  of  the  horse,  the  teacher  of 
horsemanship,  and  the  patron  of  horse  races.  It 
would  seem  then  that  this  myth  cannot  but  have 
some  connection  with  that  of  the  centaurs,  whether 
on  the  side  of  the  goddess  or  that  of  the  god.  and  in 
'  E.  Pais,  of',  fit.,  pp.  in- 15. 


296  Florence  Past  and  Present 

fact  the  story  goes  on  to  say  that  when  the  centaurs, 
fleeing  from  the  Lapithi,  reached  the  caves  of  Malea, 
Poseidon  took  under  his  protection  those  whom 
slaughter  had  spared:^  clearly  he  who  had  "l-TrTrev^ 
as  his  surname  could  do  no  less.  And  his  consort — 
Demeter  with  the  horse's  head,  herself  a  kind  of 
centaur,  though  by  transposition  of  parts — does  she 
deny  her  kind  ?  Perhaps  in  Greece,  though  even 
there  the  argument  is  but  that  of  silence.  But 
suppose  her  the  darker  form  of  Venus  Er\xina,"-  and 
follow  her  in  this  character  to  the  Tuscan  Er\'x  at  the 
Verruca.  Below  that  singular  hill,  and  close  to  the 
x^rno  that  bounds  it  on  the  south,  lies  the  village  ot 
San  Giovanni  alia  Vena.  Here  they  work  clay  and 
burn  it  in  many  forms,  and  among  the  toys  turned 
out  from  the  kiln  in  hundreds  and  thousands  for  the 
village  markets  and  fairs  of  Tuscany,  a  constant  t_\pe, 
even  to-day,  is  that  of  the  horseman  who  is  all  horse 
and  only  partly  man.  He  does  not  bestride  his 
steed,  for  he  has  no  legs  ;  he  is  one  with  his  horse 
from  the  waist  downwards.  That  the  horse  is  com- 
plete, head  and  all,  may  indeed  separate  this  t\-pe 
sharply  from  that  of  the  centaur  as  he  appears  in 
classic    art,  yet  only  to   bring  it  nearer   that  of  the 

^  Apollodorus,  2. 

-  The  Temple  of  Venus  Genetiix  at  Rome  had  a  votive  ofleiing  in 
the  form  of  a  sini;ular  eentaur  :  a  horse  with  human  fore-feet.  Pliny, 
N.H.,  viii.  42.  This  seems  to  have  been  an  early  fancy.  See  Dennis, 
Cities  of  Etriina,  ii.  164.  Is  it  possible  that  in  our  Tuscan  e.xample 
the  front  feet  of  the  horse  are  really  meant  to  be  human,  i.e.  those  of 
his  rider  ? 


Ceppo  and  Befana  299 

Phigalian  cave,  the  Demeter  who,  of  the  horse  she 
once  was,  retained  alone  the  significant  head.  The 
figures  made  under  the  Verruca  are  probably  the 
centaur  in  his  local  Tuscan  type,  and  may  possibl}' 
derive  from  a  Greek  tradition  more  ancient  and 
persistent  than  that  which  has  found  expression  in 
the  works  of  famous  sculptors.  These  artists  may 
indeed  be  supposed  to  have  selected  what  best  suited 
them  from  among  the  many  forms  which  earh'  fancy 
had  conceived  and  primitive  art  embodied. 

Pursuing  this  matter  of  the  centaur,  yet  another 
alias  of  the  black  Demeter  offers  herself  to  our 
attention  in  the  dark  Hecate,  the  Diana  of  the 
infernal  regions.^  The  two  are  practically  indis- 
tinguishable, especiall}-  at  the  Compitalia,  for  the 
cross-roads  were  definitely  sacred  to  Diana,  and  she 
must  certain  1\-  be  taken  into  account  when  we  try 
to  understand  all  that  was  meant  by  the  Mania  who 
held  her  place  there.  Is  it  so  strange  then  to  find 
that  when  the  evil  spirit  appears  at  the  cross-roads  of 
Florence  popular  fancy  gives  him  the  form  of  a  black 
horse  ?  -  For  evidently,  the  same  ideas  which  gave 
birth  to  the  callicant:::ari  of  Greece  are  here  at  work 
to  the  same  purpose ;  all  the  more  that  sound,  in 
Tuscany   as   in  Greece,  is  relied   on   to  banish  such 

^  The  Venus  of  Psophis,  and,  presumably,  of  Zacynthus,  became 
Diana  at  the  further  cohmy  (if  Saguntuni.  See  Pliny,  N.H.,  xvi. 
40. 

-  In  1243  during  the  preaching  of  Peter  of  Verona.  See  E. 
Bacciotti,  Fircnze,  iv.  (1888),  p.  172,  and  P'ineschi,  Memorie,  p.  98. 


300  Florence  Past  and  Present 

demons  of  the  darkness.  In  the  story  just  alluded 
to,  the  voice  of  the  saint,  preaching  by  the  pillar  at 
the  cross-roads,  at  once  summons  and  puts  to  flight 
the  opposing  devil.  In  memor\'  of  this  wonder  a 
shrine  of  the  MadfMina  is  built  at  the  opposite  corner, 
facing  the  pillar  of  the  goddess,  and  she  is  the 
Madonna  della  Trouiba.  Even  the  clay  centaurs  made 
at  San  Giovanni  have  a  whistle  in  their  tail.  I  have 
heard  these  horse-whistles  blown  in  a  Tuscan  church 
during  a  religious  ceremony,  and  it  would  seem  likely 
that  the  form  given  them  indicates  the  dark  horse- 
man, or  callicaiitzaros,  as  the  specific  devil  their  sound 
is  supposed  to  banish  and  defeat.  But  this  matter  of 
noise  as  the  remedy  for  evil  recalls  us  to  the  Befana 
feast,  where  it  reigns  indeed,  }'et  only  in  a  climax,  and 
accompanied  by  rites  that  demand  further  attention. 

Manni,  the  historian  of  the  Befana,  tells  us  that  for 
the  night  of  January  5th  each  Florentine  house 
prepared  a  doll  of  rags  or  other  matters  in  the  form 
of  a  woman. 1  This  figure,  called  the  Befana,  had  a 
black  face,  was  carried  through  the  streets  at  dusk  in 
an  irregular  procession  with  rude  torches  and  burning- 
straw,  to  the  music  of  horns,  bells,  and  whistles,  and 
next  day  was  set  up  in  the  windows  before  the  pass- 
ing crowd.  About  the  Befana  much  popular  supersti- 
tion gathered.  She  lived  all  year  in  the  chimney  ; 
hence  her  black  face.     On  the  night   of  January   5th 

1  D.  M.  Manni,  ht.  Not.  .  .  .  dtUc  Be/anr,  Lucca,  1766.  See 
also  the  poems  of  Fagiuoli. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  301 

she  came  out  and  visited  the  house  for  a  double 
purpose  ;  filHng  the  stockings  of  good  children  with 
presents,  and  seeking  the  bad  in  their  beds  to  wound 
and  perhaps  kill  them  with  the  knife  she  carried  at 
her  belt.  Those  who  woke  during  her  rounds  might 
see  the  walls  of  the  house  changed  into  cheese,  or 
find  the  sheets  of  the  bed  become  the  paste  of  which 
maccaroni  are  made,  for  the  Befana  w^as  powerful  and 
liberal.  At  such  a  moment,  for  the  asking,  an\'  one 
might  himself  be  changed  by  the  same  power  into 
whatever  form  or  person  he  desired.  Such  prayers 
were  not  always  happy  in  their  results  however,  and, 
on  the  whole,  the  Befana  was  as  much  dreaded  as 
desired,  for  her  very  favours  brought  danger  with 
them.  Defence  was  sought  parti)-  by  the  light  and 
noise  of  her  procession,  parti)'  by  the  last  d)'ing 
embers  of  the  log  kindled  twelve  days  before  on  the 
night  of  Yule,  and  partly  by  certain  special  precautions 
used  chiefly  in  the  case  of  children.  They  must  sup 
heartily  of  beans  on  the  night  of  fear,  saying,  as  they 
made  the  ancient  sign  of  the  coma  with  their  fingers, 
'  Befana  va  via  ;  tu  e  la  tua  Malia,'  or  more 
explicitly  : — 

'  Befana,  Befana,  non  mi  bucare, 
Ch'io  ho  mangiato  pane  e  fave 
Ed  ho  un  corpo  dure,  duro, 
Che  mi  suona  come  un  tamburo.' 

If  the  worst  came  to  the  worst,  protection  was  sought 
in  the  great  kitchen  mortar,  or  under  the  board  used 


302  Florence  Past  and  Present 

for  rolling  and  cutting  the  paste  ;  for  beneath  one  or 
other  of  these  domestic  utensils  the  threatened  child 
was  thought  quite  safe.  The  fear  of  the  Befana  was 
naturally  used  during  the  whole  year  by  parents  and 
nurses  as  means  of  controlling  the  unruly. 

Now,  in  all  this,  it  is  easy  to  see  the  survival  of 
ancient  mythology  and  usage.  The  Befana  doll  with 
the  black  face  is  the  dark  Mania  figured  at  the 
Compitalia  in  what,  one  supposes,  must  have  been 
nearly  the  same  form.  She  fills  children's  stockings, 
and  thus  shares  the  office  of '  Santa  Claus,'  who,  in 
one  country  or  another,  on  the  5th  of  December  or 
Christmas  Eve,  is  busy  in  the  same  benevolent  duty. 
But  Santa  Claus  is  St.  Nicolas,  whom  the  latest 
investigations  of  Greek  Folk-Lore  have  identified 
as  the  successor  of  Poseidon.^  Thus  the  Befana 
appears  as  the  consort  of  Poseidon,  and  may  therefore 
fairly  be  taken  as  a  modern  form  of  the  black 
Demeter ;  declared  as  such  even  by  her  liberality. 
Hers  are  the  uncouth  brood  of  the  calliaDitzari  that 
haunt  Greek  chimneys,  and  she  herself  chooses  the 
same  retreat  in  Tuscany,  from  which  she  issues  once 
a  year  for  weal  or  woe.  The  mortar,  or  domestic  mill, 
and  the  rolling  board  on  which  the  dough  is  worked, 
both  belong  naturally    to    the    corn-goddess  ;    hence 

'  Lawson,  op.  cil.,  pp.  75-6.  See  L Asprontonte  Occidmtalc  of 
Malvezzi  and  Zanotti-Bianco  (Milano,  1910),  p.  161,  for  a  Calabrian 
prayer  to  S.  Nicola,  which  shows  that  he  is  regarded  in  Italy  too  as 
the  '  salvezza  dei  naviganti.'  At  (".alatro  he  shares  the  year  with  '  S. 
Maria  della  Montagna,'  ibid.,  p.  165. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  303 

they  are  relied  on  as  a  means  of  averting  her  malice. 
Of  fire  and  noise  there  is  hardly  any  need  to  speak 
further;  in  Tuscany  as  in  Greece  they  accompany 
the  period  of  danger  and  are  supposed  to  keep  at  a 
distance  all  that  threatens. 

Just  here,  however,  a  certain  difference  of  practice 
appears.      In  Greece  the  whole  period  of  the  twelve 


BELLS,   WHISTLE,  AND  TRUMPET  OK  tiLASS  USED  ON  NIGHT  OF  BEFANA 

days  is  full  of  clamour  from  Christmas  to  Epiphany 
In  Crete,  on  Mount  Pelion,  in  Scyros  and  Macedonia 
alike,  the  villages  furnish  companies  of  mummers  in 
wild  and  shaggy  masks  hung  with  many  bells  who 
dance  the  danger  away  with  a  constant  din.  Their 
hands  are  blackened,  their  faces  hidden,  and  with 
lights  and  this  wild  music  they  clef}-  the  powers  of 
darkness.^  At  Florence,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
blowing  of  horns  and  whistles  and  the  ringing  of  clay 
bells,   not  unknown  during    the    preceding   week,    is 

^  Lawson,  op.  cit.,  pp.  222-26. 


304  Florence  Past  and  Present 

heard  chiefly  on  the  night  of  the  5th  of  January  :  it  is 
the  last  remnant  of  a  feast  which  the  Befana  herself 
once  graced  visibly  and  in  effig)'.  Yet  there  are 
signs  that  it  was  not  always  so.  At  Milan,  even  still, 
Christmas  Eve  is  the  night  chosen  for  a  like  clamour,^ 
and  in  the  country  places  of  Tuscany  masked  dancing 
of  a  wild  sort  has  always  tended  to  begin  with  the 
year,  so  that  in  the  smaller  towns  the  sound  of  the 
bubboli,  thus  shaken,  fairl}'  belongs  to  the  twelve  days 
and  not  only  to  the  vigil  that  closes  them.- 

But  it  is  the  masking  rather  than  the  music  we 
must  attend  to  here.  Those  who  have  seen  it  in 
Greece  have  no  doubt  of  its  meaning  ;  the  maskers 
have  done  their  best  to  look  Hke  the  callicantsari  they 
fear,  and  hope  in  such  a  disguise  not  only  to  escape 
themselves,  but  t<j  banish  the  threatened  invasion 
from  their  homes  and  town.-*  Is  there  any  trace  that 
at  Florence  too  the  same  tactics  are  known  and  acted 
upon  ? 

As  we  have  seen,  it  iias  been  the  Morentinc  habit 
to  prepare  for  the  moment  of  danger  by  a  special 
diet.  A  full  meal  is  eaten,  and  children  especially  are 
encouraged  to  partake  plentifulK'  of  beans  against 
tlie  coming  of  the  Befana.  This  food,  as  is  well 
known,  has  certain  physical  conse(|uences,  and  the 
verse  the  full-fed  children  sing  shows  that  these  are 
counted  on  for  the  success  of  the  matter    in    hand. 

'  Kiv.  del  Toiiriiii^  Club,  1908,  p.  556. 

^  See  above,  p.  267.  •'  Lavvson,  op.  ciL,  p.  227. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  305 

Only  the  children  whose  bodies  are  '  like  drums '  are 
those  who  may  hope  to  escape.  Now,  turning  to  the 
darkest  form  of  the  Greek  superstition,  it  is  re- 
markable that  among  the  characteristics  of  the 
vampire  men  have  long  reckoned  just  this  drum-like 
appearance  of  the  body.  From  Leo  Allatius  to  the 
Jesuit  Pere  Richard,  the  sequence  of  tradition  is 
complete,  and  the  word  rvjuTramio^  has  ever  been  used 
to  describe  the  dreaded  visitant.^  Nay  more,  and 
closer  still  ;  Richard  reports  that  on  one  occasion,  at 
Amorgos,  vampires  were  seen  in  broad  daylight  '  five 
or  six  together  in  a  field,  feeding  apparently  on 
green  beans."-  However  this  strange  belief  may  be 
accounted  for,  it  is  difficult  not  to  suppose  some 
relation  between  it  and  the  Florentine  practice."  The 
meal  of  beans  on  Twelfth  night  seems  to  correspond 
with  the  Greek  mumming,  and  to  imply  imitation  as 
a  means  of  defence  ;  it  is  the  '  defensive  mimicry,'  not 
of  science  but  of  mythology.  Is  there  a  fear  ?  Pre- 
tend   then   to  be   what  you   fear  and    }'ou   are  safe. 

^  Lawson,  o/'.  cit.,  pp.  365,  370,  3S1,  3S5,  400. 

"Ibid.,  p.  368. 

^  The  vampire  is  not  unknown  in  Tuscany,  as  appears  from  a 
popular  ballad  '  Lo  Stregone  coi  denti  rossi.'  See  C.  G.  Leland, 
Legends  of  Florence,  i.  p.  221  seq.  Compare  also  Florentine  saying 
of  burial-feast  in  the  Contado,  'si  mangiano  le  midolle '  (Pitre 
Archivio,  vi.  p.  96).  It  may  be  that  feasting  was  supposed  to 
hasten  the  corporal  dissolution  of  the  dead.  In  Greece  this  dissolution 
is  thought  very  important  as  it  prevents  the  possibility  of  vampirism. 
See  Lawson,  op.  cit.,  pp.  401-538  passim.  For  notice  taken  of  bodies 
found  entire  and  therefore  ominous,  see  Lastri,  Oss.  Fior.,  vi.  pp.  200, 
201,  and  authorities  there  quoted. 

U 


3o6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

whether  from  vampire  or  callicaiitaaros  !  The  bean 
baked  in  the  Twelfth-night  cake  of  France  and 
Germany  is  no  doubt  a  modified  and  attenuated  form 
of  the  full  Florentine  meal. 

In  common  Tuscan  talk'befana'  means  a  witch, 
and  this  by  no  freak  of  language,  for  whether  the 
matter  be  studied  generally  or  in  detail,  mediaeval 
witchcraft  will  be  found  to  descend  in  a  plain 
succession  from  just  that  body  of  superstitious 
beliefs  and  practices  we  have  been  examining. 
Children  are  commonly  the  victims  of  these  evil 
arts,  just  as  they  suffered  at  the  Compitalia,  or  as, 
more  lately,  they  trembled  on  Twelfth  night.  Crops 
gave  the  witch  another  favourable  opportunity,  as 
if  she  were  indeed  the  black  Demeter  her  mistress, 
moody  and  bent  on  mischief.^  But  the  infernal 
Diana  is  still  more  distinctly  seen  in  the  dark 
succession.  Hers  are  the  cross-roads  where  the 
dead  might  be  met,  and  whither  witch  and  wizard 
repaired  by  night  to  work  their  spells.^  Hers  is  even 
the  name,  '  Diana  Dea  Paganorum,'  which  appears 
in  the  Dccrctuvi  as  that  of  the  witches'  leader  and 
queen,    along    with    the    name    of    her    second     in 

1  There  is  another  point  of  correspondence  in  tlie  relation  of 
Demeter  and  Poseidon  to  each  other.  See  Miclielet,  La  Sorcicre 
(Paris,  1862),  p.  166,  and  Leland,  Legends  of  Florence,  i.  (1895), 
pp.  248-9;  ii.  (1896),  209  II. 

-  How  far  this  may  go  back  it  is  difficult  to  say.  Offerings  at 
cross-roads  to  '  the  great  lady  and  her  train '  were  lately  made  in 
Zacynthus  as  to  Hecate  ;  see  Lawson,  op.  cit.,  p.  170,  and  remember 
connection  of  Zante  with  Florence, 


Ceppo  and  Befana  307 

command,  Herodias/  whose  connection  with  Epiphany 
and  the  Befana  is  sufficiently  obvious,  even  without 
reference  to  the  fact  that,  as  Radodese,  she  has 
become  the  Befana  of  Venice.-  The  dread  name  of 
Mania  long  survived  in  the  viauies,  as  some  French 
witches  called  the  wax  images  used  in  their  spells  :  ^ 
the  name,  and  we  may  add,  the  very  form  of  the 
classic  Maniae.  That  the  Queen  of  the  Night  could 
be  liberal — was  a  true,  though  dark,  Demeter — appears 
further  when  she  is  called  Alnuidia  in  the  doctrine  of 
sorcery.*  With  a  start,  one  recognises  the  AbiDidantia 
of  the  Florence  cross-roads  by  the  market,  and  knows, 
better  than  before,  why  the  evil  spirit  chose  this  place 
for  his  dark  appearance  to  hear  sermon  ;  and  why, 
over  against  the  goddess  on  her  pillar,  was  set  the 
trumpet  of  the  Madonna's  Shrine.  That  pillared 
figure  is  the  Befana,  and  still,  to  sound,  fire  is  added 
for  her  defeat,  as  every  oven,  heated  sevenfold  to 
roast  a  Tuscan  witch,  can  testify,  even  to-day  ;  •'•  not 
to  speak  of  the  witch-burnings  of  earlier  times. 

What  is  the  real  meaning  of  it  all  ?  The  log  of 
Ceppo  carries  us  back  to  the  first   woodland  life  of 

'  Decrctuni,  p.  ii.  c.  xxvi.  qu.  12,  g  i.  This  is  the  earliest  document 
bearing  on  the  subject.  The  passage  referred  to  seems  to  have  been 
quoted  from  St.  Augustine,  which  would  carry  these  names  back  to 
the  fourth  century.      But  the  treatise  in  question  is  spurious. 

-  Manni,  op.  ctt.,  p.  16.  ^  Ducange,  Glossarium,  s.v. 

■•  Ibid.,  s.v.  'Abunda'  and  'Diana.' 

^  Pitre,  Arckivio,  xii.  pp.  1 23- 5,  quotes  contem.porary  legal 
evidence  of  a  terrible  case  which  occurred  at  Ponte  a  Ema  near 
Florence  as  late  as  1893. 


3o8  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Tuscany  ;  may  it  not  be  that  there,  in  the  woods, 
the  secret  is  waiting  that  will  explain  these  mysteries. 
If  one  is  to  sum  up  the  strange  rites  of  Ceppo  and 
Befana  and  the  days  between,  in  Greece  and  at 
Florence  alike,  their  substance  seems  to  lie  in  the 
defiance  of  death  under  masks  and  on  a  principle  of 
imitation.  Now  at  first,  and  in  the  woods,  this  was 
just  what  must  have  been  habitually  done  in  the 
easiest  and  most  natural  way.  Death  threatened  the 
hunter  in  two  forms ;  by  famine  in  the  failure  to 
procure  food — that  is,  game — and  b\-  war,  in  the 
onset  of  hostile  tribes  pretending  rights  in  the  same 
hunting  ground.  In  either  case,  what  we  may  call 
the  mask  was  obviously  the  best  defence.  Clothed 
in  the  skins  of  animals,  copying  their  stealth}'  move- 
ments, the  hunter  best  followed  and  secured  the  game 
on  which  he  lived.  In  the  same  mask  he  eluded 
pursuit,  or  chose  that  defence  in  a  bolder  spirit  to 
defy  and  intimidate  his  human  foes.  Masking  for 
these  purposes  was  at  once  difficult  and  important. 
It  had  to  be  learnt  as  a  fine  art,  and  was  taught  to 
bo)'s  on  their  entr}'  on  manhood  by  the  most  ex- 
perienced hunters  and  warriors  of  the  tribe.  The 
initiation  ceremonies  of  savages  in  many  parts  of  the 
world  have  continued  to  our  own  time  relics  of  what 
must  have  been  once  the  universal  practice.^     To  the 

'  For  examples,  see  Eraser,  Golden  Bough,  iii.  pp.  422-46.  Note 
that  ludere  means  to  imitate,  and  gives  the  Ludi  Compitales,  originally 
no  doubt  the  masked  dancing  of  this  season.  So  also  the  Ludi 
Romani  of  September. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  309 

masks,  noise  of  all  kinds,  and  lights,  would  naturally 
be  added  when  the  war-dance  was  fairly  on  foot,  as 
a  further  means  of  confusing  the  enemy  and  avoiding 
the  death  he  threatened.^ 

If  the  supernatural  be  now  added  to  the  natural, 
we  have  all  the  elements  necessary  to  resolve  the 
problem.  The  magical  idea,  in  its  discovery  of  a 
false  cause  and  reliance  on  it  as  if  it  were  true, 
explains  sufficiently  the  later  meaning  and  long 
persistence  of  what  we  are  studying.  The  hunter's 
training  dance  in  which,  masked  and  in  company,  he 
mimics  the  game,  comes  to  be  thought  of  as  a  spell 
to  secure  abundant  supplies  of  food  in  the  fertility  of 
the  furred  and  feathered  tribes  on  which  the  life  of 
the  hunter  depends,  or  even,  in  a  further  reach  of 
fancy,  to  defeat  death  indirectl}',  yet  effectually,  by 
increasing  the  birth-rate  of  the  tribe  itself.  War,  one 
sees,  becomes  less  dreadful  to  peoples  convinced  that 
they  hold  in  their  own  hands  the  secret  of  producing, 
as  well  as  training,  warriors  ;  and,  though  death 
cannot  be  altogether  danced  away,  these  initiation 
ceremonies  are  often  directed  to  such  purpose  that 
the  fear  of  falling  in  battle  is  almost  got  rid  of.  In 
them,  with  man\-  cruel  accompaniments,  the  youth 
'dies,' as  it  were  by  anticipation,  ere  he  is  admitted 
to  the  status  of  a  warrior  and  the  privileges  of  the 
totem  society.  Sometimes  the  totem  is  the  weapon 
itself  that  '  kills  '  him,  and  from  such  '  death  '  he  then 
^  See  Gideon's  stratagem,  Judges  vii.  20. 


3IO  Florence  Past  and  Present 

rises  invulnerable.  It  is  the  wisdom  of  'the  old  man 
of  the  mountain  '  in  a  more  primitive  shape,  and  as  the 
Assasshis  woke  from  the  paradise  of  their  haschisch- 
dream  to  affront  peril  fearlessly  at  the  command  of 
that  master,  so  the  new-made  warrior  returned  from 
the  woods  convinced  that  the  bitterness  of  death  was 
past,  and  filled  with  the  lust  of  battle.  On  these 
playing-fields  of  defensive  mimicry  the  victories  of 
the  tribe  are  already  won,  for  there  death  is  met  and 
defied  by  anticipation.  The  flexible  axe  of  the 
Florence  Museum,^  in  its  close  correspondence  with 
the  '  darding  knife  '  of  the  Columbian  savage,  suggests 
that  the  totem  ism  of  weapons  was  known  in  Tuscany, 
just  as  the  saying,  '  Happy  they  who  change  their 
soul  into  that  which  at  death  they  would  become,' 
collected  of  late  from  a  Florentine  witch,-  shows  that 
the  root  principle  of  this  defensive  totemism  is  still 
recognised  here.  Who  can  hear  these  words  without 
thinking  of  their  classic  parallel  in  Sophocles  and 
Pindar, '  Happy  he  that  hath  seen  those  rites  ere  he  go 
beneath  the  earth  '  ?  -^  The  correspondence  goes  far 
to  complete  the  picture,  suggesting  on  the  one  hand 

'  Museo  Archeologico,  Sala  viii,  Case  E,  No.  15,  'Seme  palco- 
etrusco,  col  tagliente  pieghevole  ....  trovato  nel  1873  •  •  •  •  in  una 
tomba  a  ziro  di  Chiiisi.  V.  Milani,  Mus.  Ital.,  i.,  p.  307,  nota  5.'  The 
folding  back  of  such  a  blade  on  the  neck  of  the  victim  would,  one  sees, 
avoid  the  reality,  while  giving  all  the  illusion  of  an  actual  sacrifice. 
The  axe  thus  meets  all  the  conditions  of  a  totemistic  initiation  rite. 

-  C.  G.  Leland,  unpublished  collections /£?«c.f  ;//<'. 

■'  Soph., /^ra^vw.,  719  (I)ind.);  Find., /'>-rt^;//.,  137  (Bergk.);  Frazer, 
Golden  Bough,  iii.  p.  431. 


Ceppo  and  Befana  311 

that  the  Mysteries  of  Greece  were  but  a  develop- 
ment of  some  earlier,  ruder,  initiation  ceremony, 
and  on  the  other  that  Tuscany  too  had  such  rites 
which,  begun  in  the  savage  life  of  her  woods  and 
informed  b}'  woodland  magic,  became  at  last  and 
definitely  the  mysteries  of  Demeter  in  mid-winter. 
Were  it  necessary  to  insist  further  on  these  parallels, 
we  should  find  the  bean,  so  honoured  at  Befana, 
playing  its  part  among  savages  to-day  as  the  vehicle 
of  new  life  and  safety  to  the  initiate,  in  close  corre- 
spondence with  the  doctrine  of  Pythagoras.^  The 
classic  rlionibus  too,  as  the  '  bull  roarer,'  is  still  used 
in  these  savage  rites,  and  when  one  learns  that  in 
France  it  is  sometimes  called  the  lonp-garo7i^\.\\Q  name 
seems  ready  to  throw  light  at  once  on  the  Tuscan 
superstition  of  the  were-wolf  and  on  the  Roman 
Lupercalia  ;  the  more  that  the  latter  ceremony, 
connected  as  it  confessedly  was  with  the  fertility  ot 
vvomen,^  plainly  belongs  to  the  order  of  half  natural, 
half  superstitious  rites  we  are  studying. 

While  points  of  detail  such  as  these  last  touched, 
if  suggestive,  are  still  obscure,  and  probably  may 
ever  remain  so,  the  general  line  of  inheritance  and  of 

'  For  Pythagoras,  see  Pliny,  N.H.,  xviii.  12,  '  quoniam  mortuoium 
animae  sunt  in  ea.'  The  EngHsh  Morris-dance  is  said  to  mimic  'bean- 
setting  in  spring  (which  is  nothing  less  than  the  .  .  .  ancient 
pagan  invocation  of  the  earth-spirit.)'  See  the  weekly  Spectator  of 
July  24lh,  1909.  The  'hobby  horse'  of  the  dance  is  perhaps  the 
English  callicantzaros. 

^  Littre,  Dictiontiaire,'  i.\.  '  loup-garou. ' 

^  Fowler,  Roman  Festivals,  p.  320. 


3 1  2  Florence  Past  and  Present 

successive  modification  in  these  strange  rites  is  pretty 
certain.  We  have  to  do  here  with  usages  natural  to 
men  of  the  woods,  and  receiving  from  them  their 
first  development  under  a  magical  interpretation. 
In  course  of  time,  as  the  woods  show  clearings,  and 
as  culture  begins  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  rising 
villages  and  towns,  these  traditional  customs  find  a 
new  application  among  communities  become,  at  least 
in  some  degree,  agricultural.  The  fear  of  the  farmer 
represents  to  him  the  possible  failure  of  his  crop, 
and  is  above  all  natural  in  the  depth  of  winter,  when 
the  fields  are  bare  and  the  life  the}-  hide  still  doubt- 
ful. Beyond  the  death  of  the  corn  lies  his  own  as  a 
certain  consequence  of  famine  in  the  failure  of  the 
crops  he  has  sown.  A  poignant  personal  fear  knocks 
at  his  heart  and  leads  him  to  think  of  his  dead, 
whom  he  must  join  soon  if  his  corn  do  not  rise  again. 
Till  the  fatal  days  are  over,  all  manner  of  underworld 
terrors  take  shape  in  his  mind  informed  by  this  fear. 
There  is  a  dread  alternative  before  him  of  certain 
return  from  beneath ;  either  the  corn  must  spring 
again  to  make  his  heart  glad,  or  the  dead  will  come 
back  in  more  or  less  material,  more  or  less  human, 
shape  to  drag  him  down  t(j  the  shades. 

Hence  the  old  magic  with  a  new  meaning,  or  at 
least  a  new  application.  The  old  masks,  the  old 
dances,  the  old  fires  and  music,  still  mark  the  dead 
season,  but  their  minnming  has  now  another  purpose. 
The\'   serve    to    keep    up    the    farmer's    heart    at    its 


Ceppo  and  Befana  313 

lowest  ;  he  trusts  them  to  awake  the  sun  to  his  duty, 
to  banish  the  spectres  that  cold  and  fear  have  raised, 
to  secure  the  springing  of  the  crop,  and  so  keep  death 
at  a  distance.  This  transference  of  rites  from  the 
hunter  to  his  successor  the  farmer,  impossible  did 
either  truly  understand  the  facts,  becomes  easy  and 
natural  as  soon  as  these  facts  of  nature  and  of  ritual 
receive  a  magical  interpretation.  The  hunter  had 
elaborated  his  mysteries  in  the  woods  in  a  faith 
which  secured  him  from  at  least  the  fear  of  death. 
In  presence  of  the  same  fear  why  should  not  the 
farmer,  his  successor  and  heir  in  a  like  faith,  continue 
the  practice  and  still  find  it  successful  ?  The  rem- 
nants of  his  rites  survive  in  the  usages  of  Ceppo 
and  Befana,  which  thus  continue  to  our  own  day 
what  la}-  behind  all  Tuscan  farming,  even  the  first  ; 
the  woodland  life  and  its  issue,  the  magic  of  the 
woods. 


CHAPTEE   XIII 

MID-LENT   AND    EASTER 

Mid-Lent  at  Florence  is  the  day  of  the  scala^  a 
characteristic  local  usage  still  observed  by  the  people. 
These  ladders  appear  in  different  forms  ;  sometimes 
they  are  cut  out  of  cardboard  and  chalked,  so 
that  the  children  who  carry  them  can  easily  transfer 
the  sign  to  the  clothes  of  the  heedless  ;  some- 
times many  appear  side  by  side  on  a  thin  sheet  of 
perforated  paper  sin-mounted  by  more  clever  scissor- 
work  in  a  floral  pattern,  ready  to  be  pinned  to  the 
skirts  of  the  passer-by.^  Sometimes  the  ladder 
inspires  even  the  pastr)'-cook,  and  lends  its  form  to 
various  kinds  of  biscuit  set  for  sale  in  the  shop 
windows.  When  tlic  children  have  succeeded  in 
]:)laying  successfull\-  the  trick  of  the  day,  they  run 
off,  mocking  their  victim — who  is  mostly  an  old 
woman — with  the  traditional  cry  L"ha !  L'hae — 
'  you  've  got  it !  ' 

The  background    of  this    custom    yields   material 
which  helps  to  exj^lain  it,  and  to  show  its  relation  to 

'  See  specimens  in  the  Museum  of  Ellmogiaphy,  Florence. 
.314 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  315 

similar  observances  in  other  places.  It  is  said  that 
during  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries  it  was 
the  habit  here  to  mark  the  day  by  dressing  a  large 
doll  in  the  form  of  an  old  woman,  which  was  stuffed 
with  nuts  and  dried  fruit,  and  tied  to  a  ladder.  Thus 
prepared,  the  doll  was  carried  in  triumph  to  the 
Mercato  Nuovo  and  sawn  in  two  ;  the  children 
scrambling  for  what  fell  out.^  Of  the  complete  cere- 
mony of '  sawing  the  old  woman  '  some  details  have 
survived  in  one  place,  some  in  another.  Naples  and 
Calabria  keep  the  saw  to  mark  the  day,  while 
Florence  retains  the  ladder,  but  the  rite  was  evidently 
the  same  in  each  case,  and  represents  a  widespread 
custom.- 

If  we  accept  the  view  which  makes  the  '  old 
woman '  represent  the  past  )'ear,  it  is  pretty  plain 
that  the  ceremony  just  described  is  appropriate  to 
one  period  only,  and  must  once  have  been  performed 
at  a  fixed  date,  representing,  as  it  did,  the  death  of 
the  year.  Nor  should  it  be  difficult  to  discover,  for 
Florence  at  any  rate,  what  that  date  was.  At  present 
the  day  of  Mid-Lent  varies  between  the  limits  of 
February  24th  and  March  30th.  Now  within  this 
period  falls  the  24th  of  March,  which  we  know  was, 
till  1749,  the  last  day  of  the  year  at  Florence.'^  If 
we  suppose  what  is  most  probable,  that   the  '  sawing 

^  Pitre,  Archh'io,  iv.  294. 

-  For   correspondences  in  other  countries,  see  Frazer,  op.  cit.,  ii. 
pp.  86  seq. 

■*  Bigazzi,  Iscrizioni^  p.  65. 


3i6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

of  the  old  woman  '  once  took  place  re^ularl}-  at  this 
definite  date,  then  the  ceremony  becomes  intelligible, 
and  is  seen  to  relate  itself  naturally  to  what  we  have 
already  observed.  The  Florentine  year  opened  with 
the  equinox  of  spring.  The  last  day  of  the  old  year 
was  clearly  the  time  to  bid  farewell  to  the  fear  oi 
winter  and  the  winter  cold.  In  the  '  old  woman  '  we 
see  the  final  appearance  of  the  Matiia  or  Befaua  of 
January  as  it  were  in  her  dotage,  yet  still  in  part 
beneficent  and  bearing  gifts,  though  of  a  dry  and 
dying  sort,  as  she  herself  is  ready  to  be  done  away. 
Even  the  children's  trick  in  the  streets,  which  survives 
to-day,  appears  as  just  that  bitter  scorn  of  age, 
especially  in  woman,  which  has  always  been  a 
Florentine  characteristic.^  '  Age  is  upon  you,'  is 
the  sense  of  the  '  L'ha  !  L'hae,'  '  and  the  fruits  of 
age,  and  of  the  past,  are  all  that  \'Ou  can  hope  to 
yield.' 

According  to  the  Christian  ecclesiastical  Calendar 
twenty  days  now  separate  Mid-Lent  from  Easter,  but 
if  the  '  sawing  of  the  old  woman  '  once  fell  regularly 
on  the  last  day  of  the  year,  and  if  that  day  was  the 
24th  of  March,  it  is  not  so  certain  that  the  ceremony 
now  to  be  described — that  of  Easter  Saturday — may 
not  have  once  closely  followed  on  the  other,  and  been 
observed  with  equal  regularity  on  the  25th  of  March, 
the  Florentine  New  Year's  Day.  Occasionally,  as 
every  one  knows,  it  falls  on  that  very  date  still,  and 

'   See  above,  pp.  SS-9. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  317 

there  are  reasons  for  thinking  it  may  originally  have 
known  no  variation  from  it.  These  reasons  will 
appear  as  we  study  the  feast  itself 

The  peculiarity  of  Easter  at  Florence  is  certainly  to 
,be  found  in  the  Easter  car  then  kindled,  and  this 
strange  fire  of  Easter  Saturday  seems,  even  at  first 
sight,  a  renewal  in  other  form  of  the  ceppo  that 
burns  at  Christmas  :  a  thing  hardly  Christian,  almost 
certainly  derived  from  pagan  worship.  To  it  surely 
may  be  applied,  with  double  emphasis,  the  words  of 
the  old  ecclesiastical  historian  when  he  says  : — '  The 
Saviour  and  his  Apostles  have  enjoined  us  by  no  law 
to  keep  this  feast  .  .  .  the  Apostles  had  no  thought 
of  appointing  festival  days,  but  of  promoting  a  life  of 
blamelessness  and  piety.  And  it  seems  to  me  that 
the  feast  of  Easter  has  been  introduced  into  the 
Church  from  some  old  usage  ;  just  as  many  other 
customs  have  been  established.'  ^  If  the  feast  itself  is 
open  to  such  criticism,  what  shall  be  said  of  the  rite 
with  which  Florence  celebrates  it  ?  Surely  one  may 
find  a  strange  irony  in  the  fact  tiiat  the  Easter  Fire 
is  first  kindled  in  the  ancient  Church  dedicated  to 
those  very  '  Apostles  '  to  whom  the  appeal  just  quoted 
was  made  ! 

At  the  close  of  the  eight  o'clock  Mass,  said  within 
walls  where  the  winter  cold  still  lingers,  a  spark  is 
struck  from  flint  and  steel  with  some  ceremony,  and 
the  candle  lit  and  set  in  the  processional  lantern  of 

^  Socrates,  Eccles.  Hist.,  v.  22. 


3i8  Florence  Past  and  Present 

wrought  bronze  which  a  boy  in  training  for  the  priest- 
hood is  chosen  to  bear.  The  clergy  form  in  front,  the 
people  follow,  and  so  the  light  makes  its  way  from  the 
Church  of  the  Apostoli  along  the  Borgo,  across  the 
Piazza  della  Signoria,  and  by  the  Badia  to  the 
Cathedral,  which  is  reached  about  nine  o'clock.  A 
crowd  gathers  about  the  lantern  where  it  now  stands 
near  the  first  pillar  of  the  nave :  they  are  there  to 
kindle  the  tapers  they  have  brought,  and  so  to  carry 
the  blessed  fire  each  to  his  own  home.^ 

Meanwhile  the  team  of  white  Val  di  Chiana  oxen, 
enormous,  magnificent  this  day  in  scarlet  trappings, 
and  carrying  fans  of  flowers  between  their  horns, 
have  already  brought  the  great  car  from  its  house  on 
the  Prato  to  the  Piazza,  where  they  have  left  it  stand- 
ing midway  between  the  Cathedral  and  the  Baptistery. 
The  car  is  a  high  and  hollow  structure  of  dark  wood, 
set  on  wheels,  and  prepared  for  the  ceremony  by  the 
festoons  of  fireworks — a  continuous  squib  many  )'ards 
long  choked  at  intervals  with  bursting  charges  of 
powder — and  the  rosettes  of  paper  flowers  with  which 
it  is  hung.  A  large  Catherine  wheel,  set  horizontally, 
crowns  the  whole. 

Within  the  Church,  the  fire  brought  there  in  the 
mcjrning  has  served  betimes  to  kindle  the  Paschal 
candle.  The  clergy  of  the  Cathedral  are  come  in 
pomp   from   the   Baptistery  and   begin  the   Mass  of 

'  '  In  .Sabbato  Pasch;c,  extincto  veteri,  novus  ii;nis  benedicatur,  et 
per  pophiin  dividatur,'  Leo  iv.,  Hovi.  de  Ciira  Past.,  c.  7  (855).  See 
also  G.  Villani,  Cron.,  i.  60. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter 


319 


midday.  At  the  Gloria,  a  deacon  touches  with  the 
sacred  fire  a  squib  called  the  colojnl)i)ia,  which  rushes 
hissing  from  the  altar  along  a  wire  stretched  in  the 
nave,  and  thus  reaches  the  car  by  wa\'  of  the  west 
door  and  the  open  Piazza.  For  a  moment  nothing 
seems  to  happen,  save  the  recoil  of  the  messenger, 


EASTF.R-CAK    IN    ITS    HOUSE    ON    THE    PRAIO 


which  sometimes  returns  along  the  wire  as  it  came. 
Then  a  thread  o(  blue  smoke  curls  upward  from  the 
car,  followed  by  great  cloud-bursts  that  rise  and  drift 
away  as,  one  after  another,  the  choked  charges  of  the 
wreathed  scjuib  explode  with  deafening  sound.  The 
startled  pigeons  of  the  square  circle  overhead  ;  women 
in  the  crowd  scream  ;  the  bells  ring  out  again  from 
the  Campanile,  and  the  massed  people  move  off  to 


320  Florence  Past  and  Present 

discuss,  in  the  street  or  the  restaurant,  the  success  or 
failure  of  the  fire.  On  Easter  Saturday  the  country 
sends  its  thousands  to  Florence  for  no  other  purpose. 

Regarding  this  strange  fire,  the  popular  tradition 
runs  that  it  is  a  ceremony  brought  from  the  East  by 
Pazzo,  the  eponymous  founder  of  the  Florentine  house 
of  the  Pazzi.  He  is  said  to  have  been  a  Crusader, 
and  the  first  to  plant  the  cross  on  the  walls  of 
Jerusalem.  Some  say  he  brought  the  fire  back  in  his 
hands  all  the  way  from  the  Holy  Land  ;  others  that 
what  he  carried  was  the  stone  still  used  in  the  Church 
of  the  Apostoli  to  obtain  it.^  In  memory  of  this 
prowess,  the  car  of  Easter  Saturday  used  to  pass  from 
its  first  position  to  another  at  the  corner  of  the  Corso 
beside  the  Pazzi  Palace.  Three  years  ago  it  went 
instead  to  the  new  Piazza  Vittorio  Emanuele,  but 
still  received  the  fire  for  this  second  explosion  from 
the  Canto  dei  Pazzi  by  a  fresh  colonibiiux  travelling 
on  a  wire  stretched  along  the  line  of  the  Corso  and 
the  Via  degli  Speziali.  In  1909  a  tragedy  happened, 
and  this  year  the  second  explosion  has  been  forbidden 
by  the  authorities. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  the  Pazzi  had  nothing 
to  do  with  the  fire  ceremony  till  about  13  10.''  Their 
then  contemporary,  Villani,  distinguishes  the  cere- 
mony itself  from  the  care  of  the  Pazzi  who  had  come 

'  Or  stones,  for  I  believe  there  are  three.  One  or  other,  or  all,  are 
said  to  come  from  the  Holy  Sepulchre. 

"  Letter  of  Dr.  R.  Davidsolm  to  Syndic  of  Florence.  See 
Corriere  delta  Sera,  5  June  1909. 


X 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter 


0^3 


to  support  and  encourage  it  ;  adding  that  it  must  be 
supposed  as  old  as  the  first  Florentine  Christianity,  if 
not  older  ;  for  he  has  already  said  : — '  contuttoche  i 
Fiorentini  di  nuovo  fossono  divenuti  Cristiani,  ancora 
teneano  molti  costumi  del  Paganesimo.'  ^  It  would 
seem  safest,  therefore,  to  forget  the  popular  tradition 
of  Florence  save  in  two  points  :  that  the  fire  cere- 
mony was  an  importation  from  the  East,  and  that  it 
had  something  to  do  with  the  walls  of  an  eastern 
city.  Both  these  points  will  be  found  justified  by  the 
facts  of  the  case. 

Looking  then  without  prejudice  at  the  rite  itself,  it 
seems  tolerabh-  certain  that  the  car  of  the  present 
day  has  taken  the  place  of  what  was  once  a  simple 
fire.  Only  two  years  ago,  I  happened  to  spend 
Easter  Saturday  in  the  village  of  Settimo,  and 
noticed  how  at  noon,  when  the  faint  bells  of 
Florence  announced  the  explosion  of  the  car,  children 
were  lighting  and  tending  a  bonfire  in  front  of  the 
village  church.  So  then  it  must  once  have  been  in 
the  capital  too  ;  the  countr\'  is  an  excellent  museum 
for  the  stud}-  of  the  older,  perhaps  the  original, 
forms  of  usage  which  Florence  has  altered  or  lost. 

Nor  can  this  fire  have  been  single,  or  have  burnt 
alone.  As  it  is.  the  car  receives  the  spark  that 
kindles  it  from  another  fire  ;  that  which  burns  within 
the  church,  beside,  or  upon,  the  Christian  altar.  But 
we   are   seeking    a    use   older   than    the    Church    or 

^  G.  Villani,  Cron.,  i.  60. 


324  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Christianity,  and  must  suppose  two  fires  equally 
primitive  and  pagan  ;  the  one  handing  on  the  spark 
to  the  other  by  some  ritual  device  of  which  the 
actual  colombina  is  the  development  and  carries  the 
reminiscence.     What  can  this  device  have  been  ? 

The  gunpowder  now  used  to  send  the  spark  on  its 
way  along  a  level  wire  is  of  course  not  to  be  thought 
of;  its  use  will  not  carry  us  back  farther  than  at 
most,  the  fifteenth  century.^  But  surely  gravitation, 
older  than  the  world,  and  serviceable  always,  might 
meet  the  purpose,  were  only  the  pyres  arranged  on 
different  levels  so  that  a  duly  descending  cord  might 
form  the  connection  between  them.  Nor  is  this  mere 
fancy  ;  we  find  such  a  device  in  use  still,  even  after 
gunpowder  was  known  to  Europe.  At  St.  Peter's  of 
Rome  in  1493  a  white  dove  with  a  glory  set  about 
it  was  arranged  to  slide  down  a  cord  stretched 
from  the  roof  of  the  Basilica  to  the  high  altar.-  That 
the  fire  the  clove  carried  once  caught  the  cord  ;  that 
the  dove  once  fell,  and  so  died  without  doing  its 
office,  is  a  mere  accidental  detail  ;  principle  and 
practice  are  alike  assured  in  this  example,  which  fully 
justifies  our  supposition. 

Another  instance   of  the   same   device  carries   the 

^  Tlie  travelling  tirework  at  Florence  is  said  to  date  from  the 
Pontificate  of  Leo  x.  ;  the  first  half  of  the  sixteenth  century.  See  G. 
Conti,  Firenze  Vecchia,  p.  535. 

-  Muratori,  Rer.  It.  SS.  (ed.  1909),  t.  x.vxii.  p.  i.  Fasc.  4,  p.  424. 
I  am  greatly  indebted  for  notice  of  this  example  to  my  friend  Mr. 
W.  Ashburner.  See  on  this  subject  J.  R.  Schmidt,  De  Cohimbis  in 
Ecclesid  Greed  et  l.alind  usilatis,  Helmstadii,  171 1. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  327 

matter  beyond  Christianity,  and  shows  how  a  sliding 
fall,  arranged  as  we  have  supposed,  might  even  serve 
to  produce  the  fire  needed  to  kindle  the  lower  pyre. 
On  occasion,  in  Kumaon,  a  province  of  India  on  the 
slopes  of  the  western  Himalaya,  a  strange  rite  takes 
place  called  the  Barat.  A  grass  rope  is  stretched 
from  the  brow  of  a  cliff  to  the  valley  below.^  On  the 
rope  a  wooden  saddle  is  arranged  to  travel  by 
gravity,  and  on  the  saddle  a  man  sits  strapped,  with 
weights  hung  to  his  feet  to  increase  the  friction.  As 
he  shoots  down  his  airy  way,  the  saddle  smokes, 
ready  to  burst  into  flame  :  one  sees  how  easily  it 
might  be  used  to  kindle  a  load  of  straw  set  to  break 
the  shock  of  the  arrival. 

Suspicion  may  attach  to  an  example  brought  to 
Tuscany  from  the  Himalaya,  but  none  need  be  felt 
when  Tuscany  itself  produces  a  similar  use.  At 
Empoli,  till  1862,  each  Corpus  Domini  da\'  as  it 
recurred  saw  a  singular  ceremony  in  which  an  ass 
'  flew '  from  the  tower  of  the  principal  Church.-  A 
rope  was  stretched  from  the  top  of  the  Campanile 
to  the  corner  of  the  Piazza  below.  On  this  travelled 
what  may  be  called  a  saddle,  yet  on)}-  because 
fastened  by  girths  to  the  ass's  back.  It  was,  in 
fact,  a  wooden  beam,  bearing  wings  of  wood  where 
it   met  the  shoulders   of  the  animal,   and    furnished 

1  Frazer,  Golden  Boug/i  (2  ed.),  iii.  pp.  104-5,  ^^ho  refers  lo 
North  Indian  Notes  and  Queries. 

-  De  Gubernatis,  Zoological  Mythology,  ii.  p.  362. 


3^* 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


beside  with  pulleys  arranged  to  travel  on  the  cord  by 
which  the  ass  accomplished  his  '  flight.'  Thus  fur- 
nished, friction  was  nearly  eliminated  and  the 
production  of  fire  made  impossible,  but  if  we  may 
suppose  the  rite  in  ruder  form — the  rope  merely 
passed  through  the  holes  of  the  ordinary  saddle- 
bridges — fire  might  result  at  Empoli  as  easily  as  it 
still  does  in  the  Barat  of  Kumaon,  and  under  the 
same  natural  power.  It  may  be  that  this,  or  some- 
thing like  it,  was  once  the  means  used  to  kindle  the 
second  pyre  at  Florence. 

As  to  the  first,  existing  usage  is  enough  to  show, 
in  no  uncertainty,  what  primitive  practice  was  ;  for 
the  habit  of  earl)'  time  is  continued  even  now  in  the 
use  of  flint  and  steel.  Two  ways  of  firemaking  may 
be  called  primitive  ;  fire  is  struck  from  the  stone,  as 
it  still  is  on  Easter  Saturday  in  Florence  ;  or  it  is 
rubbed  from  wood  by  friction  as  savages  still  obtain 
it.  Here  then  a  new  probability  appears  to  strengthen 
our  late  supposition.  The  first  pyre  we  know  was 
kindled  b\'  percussion,  is  it  not  natural  and  likely 
that  friction  may  have  been  used  to  light  the  second  } 
Once,  one  fancies,  the  descending  cord  may  have 
been  used  as  the  actual  means  of  getting  fire.  Then, 
just  as  firemaking  b\-  friction  has  everywhere  tended 
to  die  out  before  the  greater  convenience  of  percussion, 
so  in  this  rite  while  the  first  pyre  was  still  lighted 
from  the  stone,  the  descending  cord  survived  only  as 
a  means  of  carr\ing  the  fire,  already  kindled,  from 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  329 

the  one  pyre  to  the  other.  Finally,  with  the  invention 
of  gunpowder,  the  cord  fell  to  its  present  level,  and 
now  persists  in  the  form  of  a  wire,  only  that  it  may 
direct  the  flight  and  secure  the  result. 

Such  a  probability  grows  when  this  Florentine  rite 
is  considered  in  its  relation  to  primitive  religion. 
Belief  of  a  religious  kind  early  gathered  about  the  stone 
and  the  tree.  We  have  noted  this  fact  at  Florence, 
but  the  rite  now  under  consideration  would  seem  to 
supply  a  reason  for  this  faith.  Nothing  is  more 
wonderful  than  fire,  and  at  its  first  discovery  nothing 
could  be  more  fit  to  impress  the  mind  of  man  with 
the  idea  of  a  hidden  and  mysterious  power  ready,  it 
might  be,  to  harm,  )'et  on  the  whole  beneficial  to  the 
human  race.  Now  men  had  fire  either  by  percussion 
or  by  friction,  from  stones  or  from  trees  ;  and  most 
naturally  then  the  stone  and  the  tree  were  thought  of 
as  its  source  :  the  dwelling-places  of  the  hidden  Power 
that  only  waited  evocation.  The  p}Te  itself  seems  a 
ritual  presentation  of  both,  for  its  material  comes 
from  the  tree,  and  its  form  repeats  that  of  the  pointed 
stone,  or,  as  we  may  say,  the  pyramid.  If  then,  as 
seems  almost  certain,  present  ritual  may  be  taken  as 
proving  for  primitive  Florence  the  existence  of  two 
pyres,  set  and  lit  at  the  Spring  Equinox,  nothing 
could  be  more  rituall)-  significant  than  what  we  have 
supposed  :  that  the  one  was  kindled  by  percussion 
and  the  other  by  friction,  in  what  would  be  a  further 
affirmation  of  the  tree  and  stone  as  the  twin  sources 


330  Florence  Past  and  Present 

of  fire,  the  dwelling-places   of  the  goddess  and  the 
god. 

At  Florence,  as  we  have  seen/  the  Decumanus  was 
the  ritual  road  associated,  especially  at  its  double 
cross-roads,  with  just  this  tree  and  stone,  the  signs 
and,  as  once  men  thought,  the  habitations  of  the 
goddess  and  the  god.  These  signs  of  the  indwelling 
power  we  have  found  again  in  the  rite  of  Easter 
Saturday,  and  it  is  worth  notice  how,  even  under 
Christianity,  that  rite  was  not  thought  complete  till 
the  car  had  found  its  place  on  the  ver}-  line  in  question 
at  the  corner  of  the  Via  del  Proconsolo  and  the 
Corso.  Tradition  sa)-s  it  came  here  because  of  the 
adjoining  Palazzo  Pazzi.  It  is  more  natural  to  see  in 
this  the  original  site,  sought  still  even  after  Christianity 
had  drawn  the  first  part  of  the  ceremony  to  the  space 
before  the  Cathedral.  The  interest  of  the  Pazzi  in 
the  Easter  Fire  would  thus  appear  as  the  easy  conse- 
quence of  their  having  acquired  property,  and  built 
their  house,  close  to  the  original  scene  of  the 
ceremony.-  The  legend  that  they  began  it,  which 
we  know  to  be  false,  may  yet  represent  the  abiding 

^  See  above,  p.  122. 

"  Note  however  that  the  Pazzi  held  property  that  extended  along 
tlie  Borgo  towards  the  Church  of  San  Piero.  They  were  reckoned  of 
the  Sesto  of  San  Piero,  and  had  much  to  do,  even  in  the  twelfth 
century,  with  the  Hospital  there.  As  iate  as  1628  this  family 
helped  to  pay  for  the  restoration  of  the  Church.  See  G.  Lami, 
Memorabilia,  pp.  127,  1097-8,  etc.  Eacciotti,  Firenze  Illitstrata, 
1S87,  vol.  iv.  p.  173.  Can  it  have  been  that  this  fire  was  once 
kindled  in  Piazza  S.  Piero,  the  eastern  compitnm  ? 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  331 

popular  sense  that  here,  by  the  houses  of  the  Pazzi, 
lay  indeed  the  root  of  the  whole  matter. 

Reading  the  rite  thus — as  a  very  ancient  fire- 
ceremony — one  sees  a  new  probability  :  that  just  as 
the  ceppo  burned  at  the  winter  solstice,  so  this  spring 
fire  would  find  its  most  natural  date  where  we  have 
ventured  to  set  it,  on  March  25th.  For  this  day  not 
only  opened  the  Florentine  year,  but  was  the  Spring 
Equinox  according  to  the  Julian  Calendar.  The  sun 
is  evidently  the  commanding  factor  here.  In 
primitive  belief  the  fire,  latent  in  wood  and  stone 
alike,  had  value  above  all  because  it  was  the  upper 
fire  manifesting  itself  on  earth.  Dul)'  evoked  in 
solemn  ritual,  it  furnished,  in  this  derivation  and 
correspondence,  the  sun-charm  relied  on  as  a  means 
of  controlling  the  seasons.  Hence  at  once  the 
Decumanus  as  the  scene  of  this  rite — for  such  a  road 
repeated  on  earth  the  dail}-  course  of  the  sun  from 
east  to  west — and  the  Equinox  as  its  natural  date  ; 
marking  as  this  day  did  a  critical  moment  in  the 
solar  path  among  the  signs  of  the  Zodiac. 

To  bring  the  tree  and  the  stone  into  this  corre- 
spondence with  the  sun  is  to  raise  another  question, 
which  early  man  must  in  one  way  or  another  have 
attempted  to  solve.  Obviously  the  sun  was  on  fire ; 
plain))'  fire  abode  also  in  wood  and  stone.  If  men 
believed  that  fire  was  one  and  the  same  wherever 
found,  they  must  often  have  wondered  by  what  means 
the  fire  came  from  above  to  these  its  earthly  dwelling- 


332  Florence  Past  and  Present 

places.  Two  reasons  seem  to  account  for  the 
undeniable  fact  that  the  fowls  of  the  air  were  soon 
thought  of  as  likely  go-betweens  in  this  great  matter. 
Birds  fly  out  of  sight  at  times,  but  choose  trees  as 
their  home.  Certain  birds  have  the  colour  of  fire  in 
their  plumage,  and  habits  of  boring  wood  with  their 
bills,  and  tapping  stones  in  a  wa}'  to  suggest  the 
action  of  man  when  he  elicits  fire  by  percussion 
or  friction.  Might  it  not  be  that  they  had  brought 
from  heaven  and  hidden  in  its  secret  place  the  fire 
that  man  found  sleeping  there  ? 

The  universality  of  this  belief  is  indeed  beyond 
question.  In  the  myth  of  Suy-jin,  the  Chinese 
Prometheus,  this  sage,  walking  in  heaven,  sees  there  a 
tree  which  a  bird  is  pecking  while  fire  issues  from  it ;  ^ 
an  evident  discovery  of  what  men  once  thought  the 
secret  of  the  fire  they  had  learnt  to  bring  forth.  So 
too  the  Fjort  of  the  African  Congo  have  a  fire  tale  in 
which  the  woodpecker  pla)'s  the  chief  part,  boring 
heaven  with  his  bill  to  let  fire  through.-  The  same 
bird  enjoyed  equal  honour  among  the  Greeks  and 
Romans  ;  one  must  believe  for  the  same  reason. 
Suidas  quotes  a  Cretan  inscription  which  runs : — 
'  Here  lies  the  woodpecker  who  was  Zeus.'  Now 
Zeus,  etymologically  the  equivalent  of  Jupiter,  means 
'  the  bright  one,'  and  as  Jove  was  worshipped  on  the 

^  E.  B.  Tylor,  Researches,  1865,  p.  252.  Note  tlie  alleged  derivation 
of  Prometheus  from  the  Sanscrit  Pramantha,  the  fire-drill. 

'^  R.  E.  Dennett,  I- oik -Lore  of  the  Fjort  (London,  189S), 
p.  7,  etc. 


COUNTRY    PROCESSION,    WITH    ANGIOLETTO,    ENTERING   SIGNA 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  335 

Roman  Capitol  as  Fagutalis,  the  god  n:iust  plainly 
have  been  conceived  of  by  his  worshippers  as  the 
fire  of  heaven  immanent  in  the  tree.  The  wood- 
pecker bore  his  name,  then,  because  it  was  thought  to 
bring  him  from  his  heavenly  to  his  earthly  abode. 

Nor  did  this  belief  apply  only  to  trees,  it  was  ex- 
tended to  those  stones  which  were  evidently  the  other 
dwelling-place  of  fire.  So  at  least  it  would  seem 
natural  to  interpret  the  Jupiter  Lapis,  the  mysterious 
'  avis  sanqualis  '  of  Pliny ,^  and  the  tale  in  which  Livy 
records  how  this  bird  was  seen  to  strike  with  its  bill 
the  sacred  stone  of  Crustumerium.-  The  stone  was 
sacred  as  the  residence  of  the  bright  god,  and  the 
bird  venerable  as  the  messenger  of  heaven  that 
brought  him  there.  By  an  easy  development  of  the 
original  idea  the  bird  comes  to  be  a  hierogh'ph  indi- 
cating, where  it  is  set,  the  presence  of  supernatural 
power.  So  it  appears  on  the  sacred  axes  of  Crete, 
and  is  seen  perched  on  the  pillars  that  represented 
the  tree  in  early  cults. 

In  the  Val  d'Arno  birds  certainly  play  their  part  in 
the  great  spring  festival.  On  Easter  Monday  at 
Signa  little  children  of  two  and  three  }'ears  old  ride 
into  Church  on  the  asses  that  bear  the  Easter  offer- 
ings of  oil  to  the  Pievano.  A  small  finch  is  put  into 
the  last  child's  hand,  and  presentl)'  flies  free  to  escape 
by  the  Church  door.      Its  flight  is  closely  watched, 

^  N.H.,  ix.  7.      For  woodpecker,  see  ilnd.,  x.  iS,  etc. 
-  Livy,  xli.  13. 


1  iff 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


for  it  is  believed  to  carry  the  fortune  of  the  season 
and  year  to  the  person  or  the  house  on  which  it 
first  alights.      At  Florence  on  Easter  Saturday,  the 


PROCESSION    FROM    PIEVE    CROSSES    PIAZZA    OF 

SIGNA  ;     FORTUNE-TELLER      AND     HER     TABLE 

IN    FOREGROUND 


messenger  that  travels  along  the  wire  out  of  the 
Cathedral  door  to  the  car  is  still  called  the  colouibiiia. 
Once  it  must  have  been  shaped  as  a  dove.  Earlier 
still,  as  at  Rome  in  1493,  a  living  pigeon  was  probably 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  337 

used  ;  and  even  yet,  as  at  Signa,  this  flight  is 
auspicious,  and  is  watched  to  read  the  fortune  of 
the  year. 

We  know  already  the  reason,  remote  it  may  be  yet 
certain,  which  dictates  this  practice.  The  bird  is  the 
messenger  of  heaven  to  the  tree  and  stone  ;  to  the 
pyre  then,  which  represents  both.  At  Signa,  the  finch 
chosen  ma\'  once  have  been  the  cardcllino,  the  gold- 
finch with  its  head  of  fire.  At  Florence  the  fire  is 
evident,  as  the  colovibina  burns  its  way  along  the  wire. 
And  the  bird  whose  name  it  bears — the  dove — was 
not  this  too  marked  by  nature  for  the  same  office  ? 
The  '  woodpecker  who  was  Zeus  '  owed  this  title  to 
his  red  crest  as  well  as  to  his  habit  of  drilling  trees. 
The  dove,  no  less  than  he,  wears  the  colours  of  the 
fire  in  his  changeful  neck  and  coral  feet  ;  the  fire  that 
sleeps  in  the  ashes,^  and  shines  above,  shot  with  the 
green  of  summer  foliage.  These  are  fancies,  but  not 
of  to-day  ;  they  fed  the  minds  of  early  men.  In 
Greece  Zeus  dwelt  at  Dodona,  in  the  principal  tree  of 
a  grove  hung  with  bells  of  sounding  brass,  hard  by  a 
fountain  that  rose  and  fell  with  the  sun  and  where  a 
fire  slept,  for  its  water  could  kindle  torches.  The 
bird  of  this  grove  was  the  dove,  which  lent  its  name 
to  the  priestesses,  and  all  Greece  sought  Dodona  as 
the  chief  oracle  of  the  god.  So  the  country  still 
pours  in  to  Florence  to  know  the  fate  of  the  year  ;  to 

^  Tre'Xeta,  a  wild  dove,  is  derived  from  the  adjective  TreWds, 
ash-grey. 

Y 


^^S  Florence  Past  and  Present 

learn  it  from  the  colombiiia,  while  the  bells  ring  out 
above,  and  living  authentic  doves,  wearing  the  old 
colours,  sweep  startled  across  the  sky.  These  doves 
of  the  Duomo  are  still  favourites  which  none  may 
harm  in  a  land  where  birds  are  ruthlessly  killed.  And 
this  then  because  once  they  were  so  much  more  ; 
held  for  true  fire-birds,  messengers  of  a  bright  heaven 
that  stooped,  and  a  heavenly  power  that  drew  near  to 
answer  and  to  bless. 

Was  Zeus  then,  or  Jupiter — to  give  him  his  Italian 
name — the  god  of  this  Florentine  feast  ?  Names  are 
of  little  consequence  in  religion  as  compared  with 
ideas  ;  their  meaning  is  mainly  local,  relative  and  his- 
torical. To  place  and  time  and  circumstance  we 
must  return  then,  ere  we  can  find  the  answer  to  such 
a  question. 

The  time  proper  to  such  a  rite  as  that  of  Easter 
Saturday  has  seemed  to  be  the  Equinox  of  Spring  ; 
the  more  that  Florence  then  began  her  year.  Now 
in  Greece  this  Equinox  was  the  date  sacred  to 
Cybele,  when  the  feast  of  the  goddess  and  of  her 
partner  Attis  were  celebrated  :  the  mourning  for  Attis 
mingled  with  the  succeeding  pomp  of  the  Hilaria} 
Beyond  this  general  and  obvious  agreement  there  are 
curious  details  of  belief  and  ritual  which  serve  to 
connect  the  Florentine  feast  with  that  which  Greece 
and  the  East  observed. 

The  goddess  herself  forms  the  best  point  of  depar- 

'    Macrob. ,  Sat.,  i.  2i. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  339 

ture  here.  Cybele  is  the  Semitic  Gibel/  and  means 
the  mountain.  Further  examination  of  the  name 
shows  that  its  root  lies  in  the  Hebrew  gabal  (73J^  to 
twist  as  a  rope,  from  which  comes  the  derivative 
gebid  ('?13J),  the  Hne  by  which  boundaries  are  meas- 
ured.- The  divinity,  then,  conceived  to  attach  to 
the  hill  belongs  to  it  in  its  office  as  a  dividing  water- 
shed and  limit.  The  idea  of  water  is  indeed  so  surely 
implied  here  that  the  Semitic  Cybele  becomes  in 
Greek  Rhea,  in  whom  we  have  no  difficult}-  in  finding 
the  poai  wKeavov,  the  vast  streams  thought  of  as 
bounding  on  every  side  the  habitable  earth. ^  Simi- 
larl}'  we  find  ra  Ki'/3eAu  upij,  very  indefinite  and 
mystical,'*  as  it  were  '  the  utmost  bound  of  the  ever- 
lasting hills,'  or  that  mountain  of  Kaf  which  the  xArabs 
still  believe  encompasses  the  world. 

But  the  boundary  is  not  necessarily  the  circle  of 
the  earth,  nor  always  so  absolute  and  all  embracing. 
It  may  be  as  narrow  as  a  city  wall  or  the  limits  of  a 
single  estate  or  field,  but,  larger  or  smaller,  it  is  ever 
the  enceinte,  where,  naturall}%  the  mother  goddess 
shows  her  power  and  does  her  office.  If  her  name 
spells  the  mountain  that  encompasses,  her  head 
wears    the    mural    crown,    the    civic    boundary    that 

1  Diod.  Sic,  iii.  58. 

-  Gesenius,  Thesaurus,  s.v.,  cf.  also  the  Latin  funis  and  finis,  and 
Corssen's  derivation  of  Janus  from  dividere — quasi  Divanus.  This 
would  make  him  again  the  consort  of  Cybele  on  the  Decumanus  with 
which  we  know  he  was  associated. 

•*  Plato,  Cratylus. 

•*  Daremberg  et  .Saglio,  Dictioiuiairt,  s.v.  'Cybele.' 


;40 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


encloses ;  and  hers  is  the  stone,  pointed  like  a 
hill,  that  marks  the  limits  of  lands.  She  is  the 
mother,  and  therefore  has  a  male  companion,  inferior 
at    first    yet    essential    and    ever  growing  in  impor- 


TREF.S,  NATURAL  AND  KM  UAL,  AT  MADONNA  DEL  SASSO 

tance  till  at  last  he  assumes  her  place.^     He  is  the 

tower  of  the  mural  crown,  the  tree  that,  with  the  stone, 

secures  the  rural  bouiularx'.     The  tree  of  Attis  was  in 

fact  as  eminent  at  the  Ililaria  as  the  stone  of  Cybele. 

'   In  virtue  of  this  giowtli  the  husl>an(l  is  often  the  son.     Thus  Zeus 
grew  as  the,'  son  '  of  Rhea. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter 


341 


It  were  easy  to  find  the  tree  and  the  stone  alike 
reverenced  still  at  the  spring  festival  of  the  Madonna 
del  Sasso  in  the  hills  above  Fiesole.  But  we  must 
not  wander  from  the  strict  Equinox,  nor  from  the  rite 
of  Easter  Saturday.     If  the  Decumanus  was  indeed, 


STONE   OF    MADONNA    IN    SANCTIARY    ALTAR 


as  seems  likely,  the  oriy;inal  site  of  the  fire  ceremony, 
the  ideas  represented  b\'  the  name  of  C\'bele  might 
well  demand  expression  here.  We  have  already 
supposed  that  this  road  was  originally  drawn  as  a 
boundary  between  the  lands  of  the  two  adjacent 
villages.^     A  line  or  cord  would    naturall}'  be  used, 

^  See  above,  p.  107. 


342  Florence  Past  and  Present 

and  with  some  solemnity,  when  the  division  was  made. 
What  one  is  led  to  fancy  then  is  a  yearly  ceremony 
in  which  that  solemn  measurement  w^as  repeated  in  a 
rite  that  stretched  the  cord  once  more  along  the 
Decumanus,  now  become  a  street.  The  mother  and 
protectress  of  cities  would  be  naturally  inxoked  on 
such  an  occasion,  and  the  cord  made  to  run  between 
her  pyre  and  the  fire  of  her  male  companion.  The 
spring  Equinox,  which  we  know  to  have  been  sacred 
to  Cybele,  would  naturally  fix  the  date  of  the 
ceremony.  Thus  a  new  and  plausible  meaning  might 
attach  to  the  cord  still  used  for  the  colombina  ;  it 
would  be — wire  though  it  now  is — a  survival  and 
successor  of  the  measuring  line — the  gebul — that 
made  Florence  what  she  has  become. 

Villani  sa}-s  that  Florence  was  founded  under  the 
third  degree  of  Aries,^  which  corresponds  sufficiently 
with  the  date  of  Cybele's  feast.  The  twenty-fifth  of 
March  was  thus  the  birthday,  may  it  not  also  have 
been  the  name-day,  of  the  city  which  for  so  long 
began  her  year  with  the  Equinox  of  Spring  ?  The 
name  of  Florence  does,  in  fact,  open  a  new  view  of  the 
matter  we  have  in  hand. 

Of  the  two  villages  which  came  to  the  agreement 
and  division  just  mentioned,  the  Villa  Arnina  was 
probably  the  more  important.  This  name,  now  lost, 
survives  in  that  of  the  Arno,  and  also  belonged  to 
another  stream,  the  Amine,  which  drains  and  waters 

^  G.  Villani,  Cron.,  iii.  I. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  343 

the  south-west  corner  of  Tuscany.^  Now  the  xA.rnine 
has  become  the  Flora,  just  as  Arnina  changed  its 
name  to  Florentia.  Rivers  as  well  as  hills  tend  to 
bear  divine  names,  and  to  perpetuate  them.  Hence 
a  probability  that  Florence  is  called  after  the  goddess 
Flora,  whose  earlier  Ftruscan  name  seems  to  have 
been  Arna.  Can  this  Arna,  or  Flora,  have  been 
simply  Cybele  in  a  local  alias,  and  perhaps  in  a 
further  development? 

Cybele  was  the  goddess  of  boundaries,  but  her 
name,  the  Mater  Magna,  shows  that  the  boundary 
had  importance  because  of  what  it  enclosed  and  pro- 
tected. If  her  enceinte  be  taken  as  that  of  the  field, 
then,  at  her  feast  in  spring,  she  must  have  held  the 
place  of  a  goddess  of  vegetation  ;  the  mother  of  the 
springing  corn,  the  green  mother  or  Chloris  of  the 
Greeks,  the  Flora  of  the  Latins.  At  the  Equinox  this 
peculiar  power  of  nature  was  seen  in  every  field  with 
the  springing  corn.  The  winter  was  past  and  the  life 
of  the  new  year  begun.  The  winter  fears  were  dead, 
but  they  had  left  a  succession  in  the  uncertainty  of 
the  season.  A  harvest  there  would  be,  but  of  what 
kind  ?  As  the  Florentine  year  opened  this  was  the 
question  of  the  day. 

On  a  principle  of  euphemism — the  wish  the  father 
to  the  name — Flora  now  became  Fortuna,  uncertain 
as  the  season  itself,  yet  placable  were  it  onl)-  that  she 
heard    herself  called    by  this  title.     Fortuna    is    the 

'  Amine  occurs  as  the  name  of  the  Fiora  in  the  Maritime  Itinerary. 


344  Florence  Past  and  Present 

bearing,  carrying  goddess/  the  bringer-forth  who  is 
also  the  bringer-in  ;  mistress  of  the  farm,  dispenser  of 
the  rustic  joys  of  harvest-home  when  uncertainty  is  a 
thing  of  the  past.  To  call  Flora  so  was  in  itself  an 
attempt  at  propitiation. 

Nor  need  there  be  any  doubt  that  the  two  are 
really  one,  though  we  must  look  far  afield  to  find 
proof  of  this  identity.  As  Cybele  is  really  the  eastern 
Gibel^  so  the  Fortuna  of  the  Romans  was  known  in 
Cilicia,  and  precisely  at  Tarsus,  as  'Athch  or  'Athar- 
atJicJi,  which  the  Greeks  rendered  as  Atargatis.''  On 
the  later  coins  of  Tarsus  she  is  represented  not  only 
wearing  the  mural  crown  of  Cybele,  the  civic  Fortune, 
but  grasping  ears  of  corn  in  her  hand  :  '■''  clearly  she 
was  a  corn  goddess,  and  mother  of  the  fields  as  well 
as  of  the  town.  Her  Semitic  name  appears  in  the 
Spanish  Granada,  really  Karn-'athch,^  and  under  the 
Romans  this  Phoenician  town  became  '  Florentia,' just 
as  the  Arnina  by  the  Arno  did.  This  correspondence 
should  be  enough  to  show  that  Flora  and  Fortuna 
were  really  one,  and  that  she  represented  Cybele  in 
her  character  of  a  corn  goddess.  So  the  Etruscans 
too  in  their  day  may  have  thought  to  placate  Arna  by 
calling  her  Nortia  when  the  harvest  was  in  question. 

But  the  enceinte  of  the  mother  goddess  was  the 
town-wall  as  well  as  the  boundary  of  the  field  ;  or, 
shall    we  say,  that   another   stonier  field    lay  in   her 

'  See  Fowler,  op.  cii.,  pp.  166-7.      -  Frazer,  Adonis  (1907),  p.  129. 
^  Ibid.,  p.  131.  *  Ford's  Spain  (1855),  p.  292. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  345 

embrace,  where  a  population  that  desired  increase  and 
strength  looked  to  her  for  protection.  In  this 
character  Cybele  became  ^epeVoA/?,  the  civic  Fortune/ 
concerned  with  human  increase  and  the  direct 
personal  fate  of  a  definite  society.  Such  a  goddess, 
one  sees,  is  indistinguishable  from  Venus,"'  and  as 
Cybele  assumes  this  form,  her  partner  x\ttis  suffers  a 
like  change,  becoming  the  Adonis  with  whom  Venus, 
at  least  in  the  East,  was  always  associated. 

Here  a  curious  parallel  to  the  Florentine  rite 
demands  notice.  One  centre  of  this  Venus-worship 
in  the  East  lay  at  Hierapolis  in  Syria,  where  the 
chief  festival  of  the  goddess  took  place  in  spring,  and 
was  called  the  Pyre  because  of  the  sacred  fire  then 
kindled  in  her  honour.  From  Syria  the  cult  of  the 
goddess  and  her  companion  passed  to  Cyprus,  where 
details  of  the  ceremony  are  available.  There  were 
two  pyres  it  seems,  and  the  worshippers  threw  into 
the  first  of  these  living  doves,  which  escaped  only  to 
perish  in  the  other.-^  But  clearly  this  is  a  flight  which 
could  not  be  natural ;  it  must  have  been  restrained 
and  directed  by  some  undescribed  device.  And  in  an 
artificial  flight  from  the  one  fire  to  the  other  we  have 
something  which  approaches  very  nearly  to  the 
colouibiua  of  Florence. 

'  Pindar,  quoted  by  Pausanias,  lib.  iv.  She  is  the  original  of  all 
female  saints  who  bear  in  their  hands  the  towns  entrusted  to  their 
care. 

-  For  this  Venus  of  the  Spring,  see  Macrob. ,  Sat.^  i.  21. 

^  Frazer,  Adoiis  (1907),  p.  114. 


346  Florence  Past  and  Present 

This  worship  did  not  stay  in  Cyprus,  or  even  in 
Greece  ;  it  passed  still  westward,  with  the  Phoenician 
ships  and  the  Greek  colonists,  to  find  another  home 
in  extreme  Sicily  at  the  Sicilian  Eryx.  If  we 
seek  it  here  and  not  in  Arcadia,  at  the  Psophis  of 
Zacynthus,  or  in  Spain,  it  is  onl)-  because  evidence  of 
the  Sicilian  ritual  is  available,  while  that  of  Greece 
can  but  be  conjectured.  At  Eryx  it  was  still  the 
flight  and  return  of  a  dove  that  the  worshippers 
watched,  and  this  dove  is  definitely  described  as  red  ; 
evidently  a  true  fire-bird,  whose  home  was  in  the 
mysterious  ever-burning  pyre  of  this  temple.^  Now 
we  have  already  found  reason  to  think  that  the 
goddess  passed  to  the  Val  d'Arno,  where  she  settled 
in  a  new  3'et  similar  seat  on  the  Pisan  hills.  Nor 
can  Florence  be  supposed  indifferent  to  her  worship 
when  still,  as  in  the  Anagoge  of  Eryx,  it  is  the  flight, 
and  especially  the  return,  of  a  fiery  messenger  called 
a  dove  that  her  people  count  on  and  watch  at  the 
festival  of  spring ! 

The  fire  which  accompanies  the  goddess  in  all  her 
migrations  demands  more  consideration  than  we  have 
yet  given  it.  Ultimately  as  Gibel,  Cybele,  or  the 
Baalath  of  Byblus,-  the  Dca  Syria  is  a  goddess  of 
boundaries,  and  at  these  limits  fire  is  readily  found. 
Even  in  the  Middle  Age  the  town  ditches  of  Florence 
are    still     called    carbonaria,    the    place    of    coals.'^ 

^  Aelian,  Dc  Auinialihus,  iv.  2  ;  x.  50.  -  Frazer,  Adonis,  p.  lO. 

^  Lami,  Memorabilia,  p.  986,  ad  aim.  1064. 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  347 

Already,  in  the  books  of  the  Agrimensores,  coals  are 
spoken  of  as  a  common  means  of  making  a  boundary 
permanent.^  Buried  in  the  boundary  trench,  they 
were  indestructible,  and  so  lay  ready  at  the  first 
excavation  to  show  beyond  doubt  where  the  true 
limes  ran.  Earlier  still,  ere  an}'  history  was  written 
in  books,  the  Italian  people  of  the  Tcrrainare  left  coal 
in  the  bounding  trench  of  their  towns,"-  and  bivalve 
shells — always  sacred  to  the  mother  goddess — in  the 
ritual  furrow  that  marked  the  Decumanus.^  The 
town  wall  was  sometimes  used  as  an  altar  when  the 
town  was  in  danger.^  Thus,  on  the  whole,  it  would 
seem  likeh'  that  boundaries  were  hallowed  always  by 
the  fires  of  the  mother  of  towns,  and  that  the  practice 
of  burying  coals  on  such  a  line  may  have  survived 
because  of  convenience,  but  was  originally  suggested 
by  the  remains  of  these  ritual  p}Tes. 

Pursuing  the  matter  of  fire,  we  remember  that  the 
pyre  of  Florence  was  double,  like  that  of  Cyprus. 
One  of  these  fires  must  have  been  lighted  for  the 
goddess,  and  the  other  could  only  be  that  of  her  male 
companion,  the  Adonis  of  this  Venus.  But  if  so,  the 
bond  between  them,  the  cord  on  which  the  dove 
travelled  as  a  messenger,  could  not  but  have  its  own 
meaning.  The  conjunction  of  the  goddess  and  the 
god    spelt   fertility    of  every    kind,    and    chiefly    the 

'  Siculus  Flaccus,  De  Cond.  Agroru/n,  ed.  Lachmann,  p.  140. 

'■^  Atti  d.  Accad.  d.  Lincei,  Ser.  3a,  viii.  p.  305. 

3  Boll.  d.  Pah't.  It.,  xxi.  p.  78.  ^  2  Kings  iii.  27. 


34^  Florence  Past  and  Present 

human  increase  the  town  expected  under  such 
protection.  A  singular  detail  of  the  Florentine  rite 
makes  this  certain  as  far  as  Florence  is  concerned. 
Within  the  memory  of  those  still  living,  mischievous 
boys,  armed  with  needles  and  stout  pack-thread, 
passed  unobserved  through  the  crowded  Piazza  on 
Easter  Saturday,  sewing  the  clothes  of  the  country- 
folk together  in  the  press.  Wlien  the  '  Scoppio  del 
Carro '  was  over,  and  the  crowd  broke  up,  the  feast 
became  a  true  Hilaria  of  jest  levelled  at  the  un- 
fortunate men  and  women  who  stood  perplexed  at 
the  trick,  and  confused  in  their  vain  attempts  to 
separate.^  The  pack-thread  that  joined  the  people 
clearly  corresponded  to  the  cord  that  united  the  pyres 
and  directed  the  dove,  the  messenger  of  Venus  and 
the  bearer  of  her  fires.      '  .     . 

Nor  in  all  this  were  the  fields  or  the  increase  of 
the  land  forgotten.  As  the  Italian  'Villa'  still 
means  the  estate  as  well  as  the  country-house,  so  this 
'  city '  may  be  conceived  to  have  comprehended  tlje 
territory  in  which  the  town  stood.  Both  were  put 
under  the  care  of  the  same  mother  goddess,  and  her 
wider  function  was  remembered  in  the  very  rite  that 
traced  her  narrower  boundary.  The  trench  that 
defined  the  limits  of  the  town  and  marked  its  ritual 
Decumanus  was  a  true  furrow,  and  was  traced  by  a 
plough  drawn  by  white  oxen,  as  white  oxen  still  drag 

^  See  letter  of  a  septuagenarian  in  the  Florentine  Fieramosca  for 
26  April  1909.  .  ■ 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  349 

the  car  of  Florence  to  its  place  on  Easter  Saturday. 
The  ritual  fire  kindled  at  the  Equinox  on  the  line  of 
the  Decumanus  was  meant  to  secure  fertility  in  all 
kinds  ;  in  the  fields  then,  as  well  as  among  the  people 
that  depended  on  their  produce. 

Many  details  combine  to  make  this  matter  certain. 
The  vetches  forced  for  weeks  in  the  dark  and  produced 
on  Easter  Thursday  have  seemed  to  some  a  survival 
of  the  '  Gardens  of  Adonis  '  planted  in  antiquity.^ 
If  so  they  are  really  specimen  crops,  blanched  to 
imitate  the  colour  of  ripe  corn,  and  designed,  under  a 
doctrine  of  imitative  magic,  to  procure  in  due  time 
from  nature  that  which  they  resemble  b}-  art.  In 
Indo-China  there  is  a  similar  practice,  and  it  is 
perhaps  worth  notice  that  there  too  the  dove  appears, 
for  the  specimen  field  is  reaped  when  the  crop  of 
'  secret  tillage  '  ■Aid^nds  pigcoii-Iiig/ir 

Whether  the  vetches  be  specimen  crops  or  no, 
Florence  has  still  \\hat  would  seem  the  natural 
complement  of  such  a  practice.  Cakes  are  baked 
and  sold  at  Easter  which,  within  the  form  ot  a  dove, 
enclose  a  red  Easter-egg  like  a  fiery  heart.  These 
may  well  owe  their  shape  and  use  to  the  same  order 
of  ideas.  If  a  specimen  crop  works  by  imitation, 
what  may  not  such  anticipation  be  expected  to  effect  ? 
Here  the  first  fruits  of  the  harvest  are  read)-,  as  it 
were,  before  the  time,  and  he  who  bu\-s  to  eat  may 

^  Frazer,  Adonis,  p.  211. 

^  Frazer,  Golden  B0//0/1  (igoo),  ii.  323-4. 


;5o 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


once  have  done  so  thinking  to  gain  personal  interest 
in  a  rite  which  he  believed  able  to  propitiate  the 
fickle  goddess  and  secure  the  fertility  of  his  fields. 
The  cakes  by  themselves  indeed  would  hardly  be 
enough  to   warrant  such  a  conjecture,  but   they  are 


ri.ORENTINK    EASTER-CAKES  ;    EGC'.S    IN    KASKEIS,    AND    DOVE 

not  the  only  ground  on  which  it  rests.  The  dove  and 
fire  ceremony  they  plainly  sx-mboh'se  draw  the 
country  people  in  thousands  still  for  this  chief  purpose 
that  they  may  learn  from  the  flight  of  the  colo)nbina 
what  the  harvest  will  be.  The  rite  still  furnishes  an 
oracle  then,  nia\'  it  not  once  have  promised  more? 
If  so  much  is  left  under  Christianity,  what  can  the 
full    doctrine    of   Morentine    Paganism     ha\c    been  ? 


Mid-Lent  and  Easter  351 

One  ma}^  assume  that,  whereas  the  people  now 
assemble  merely  to  know,  their  remote  forefathers 
came  to  do  :  to  take  part  in  a  rite  which  they  believed 
able  to  bind,  or  at  least  persuade,  Fortune,  and  so 
secure  her  harvest  favours. 

To  sum  up :  this  spring  ceremony  not  only  fits 
what  was  once  the  opening  of  the  Florentine  year, 
but  records  the  great  act,  otherwise  forgotten,  by 
which  Arnina  and  Camarte  came  to  a  division  and 
stable  agreement.  The  line  then  drawn  remained  to 
form  the  Decumanus  of  Florence,  and  the  agreement 
arrived  at  laid  the  foundation  of  a  union  and  progress 
which  carried  building  along  this  chief  determinant, 
and  ended  by  making  Florence  what  she  is.  But 
behind  the  great  moment  lay  a  further  past,  lost  in 
the  depth  of  woods  that  had  begun  to  give  way  to 
clearing,  construction  and  cultixation.  And  this  past 
of  the  woodland  life  it  was  that  brought  its  con- 
tribution to  the  rite  that  sealed  the  civic  peace. 
Men  had  watched  the  sun  and  wondered  at  it  long 
ere  the}'  watched  again  to  strike  this  boundary. 
They  had  found  its  hidden  fire  in  the  tree  and  in  the 
stone.  The  great  discover)-,  and  the  dreams  it 
provoked,  were  what  the\'  now  acknowledged  in  their 
rite.  The  Fortune  of  the  da\'  had  come  with  the 
first  Florentines  from  the  forest  that  was  once  the 
home  of  their  race. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE   GRILLO   AND    MIDSUMMER 

ASCENSION-DAV  is   observed    at  Florence  in  a  way 
to  make  it  one  of   the  most  characteristic  feasts  in 


^^ 


THE    OAK    OK    THE    CASCINE    IN    TIS    THREE    GENERATIONS 

tlie  Calendar  of  the  city.  At  dawn,  the  people  stream 
out  in  thousands  to  the  Cascinc,  spending  the  day 
till   noon   in    the  open   grass\-   spaces,  and  under  the 

352 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  355 

trees,  of  that  public  park.  While  this  place  was  still 
the  dairy  farm  of  the  Grand  Dukes,  custom  prescribed 
that  the  day  should  begin  with  a  drink  of  warm  milk 
taken  at  the  farm.^  The  people  then  passed  on,  as 
they  still  do,  to  a  rendezvous  at  the  ancient  oak-tree 
of  the  adjoining  park,  whence  they  scattered  again  in 
groups  to  catch  the  gril/i,  the  black  field-crickets, 
that  form,  even  to-day,  the  chief  object  of  this  outing. 
Their  prey  caught  and  caged,  the  people  dine  ;  some 
eating  on  the  grass  the  provisions  they  have  brought  ; 
others  seeking  the  rustic  restaurants  set  out  beneath 
the  trees.  At  midday  the  park  is  empty  again  ;  the 
people  have  gone  home  with  their  grilli — caught 
or  bought^ — in  the  little  cages  of  buckwheat  stem 
that  serve  to  contain  them.  The  cages  are  hung 
in  the  houses,  for  the  Florentines  think  the  cricket's 
song  brings  luck  to  the  home  ;  especially  if  the 
gril/i  can  be  kept  alive  and  vocal  till  the  day  of 
Corpus  Christi.  It  is  to  be  feared  that  few  survive 
as  long ! 

Just  this  survival,  however,  must  be  insisted  on  ; 
for  it  shows  clearly  what  Florence  has  in  mind  when 
the  gril/i  are  caught.  When  Easter  falls  late — 
towards  the  25th  of  April — Corpus  Doviiui^  as  Italy 
calls  the  further  feast,  tends  to  coincide  with  the 
summer  solstice.  Now  the  song  of  the  field-cricket, 
opening  feebly  about  the  beginning  of  May,  reaches 
its    height    only  at   midsummer,   to   die  away  about 

*  The  traditional  '  lattone.' 


356  Florence  Past  and  Present 

the   15th  of  Jul\-.^     Thus,  when  Ascension-day  falls 
on    April    30th    there   are   no  singing-  crickets ;    and 


CAOK    FOR    A    CRICKET    IN    BUCKWll  RA  T    STEM  ; 
IRADITIONAL    EORM 

evidently  the  solstice  is  the  date  at  which  any  observ- 
ance connected  with  this  insect  should  properl)'  fall. 
W^ith  this  reference  to  the  solstice  ancient  authority 
1  A.  H.  Swinton,  Insect  Variety  (London,  C'asscll),  p.  1S4. 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  359 

fully  agrees.     Pliny,  who  mentions  how  the  giylliis 

was  caught  in  his  time  with  a  hair  holding  an  ant  as 

bait,  quotes  Nigidius  for  the  great  importance  attached 

to  the  field-cricket  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Magi.     It 

burrows  in  the  earth,  he  says,  walks  backwards,  and 

sings  by  night  ;  such  are  the  reasons  he  offers  for  the 

attention    it    attracted.^      Now    the    same    backward 

movement  was  noticed  in  the  scaraba^us  of  the  Nile 

and    in    the    crab."-     Egypt    made    the    scaraba^us    a 

symbol  of  the  sun,^  and  the  world  saw  the  crab  in 

that  sign  of  the   Zodiac   which   the   sun   entered    at 

midsummer.*     In  Cancer,  the  sun  began  his  annual 

retreat  ;    hence    a    perceived     relation    between    this 

solstice  and  all  backward-moving  animals.     Amoncr 

such    then    the  grillo   held   a   place  of   honour,   and 

belonged,  like  them,  to  the  same  great  moment  in  the 

year  ;  gathering  all  the  fancies  with  which  the  solstice 

was  associated.    Some  of  these  ma}'  now  be  mentioned. 

Macrobius  says  that  the  first  point  of  Cancer  is  the 

place    where    the    milky-way    cuts    the    path    of  the 

Zodiac,  and  that  here  the  gate  opens  b)-  which  souls 

descend  to  earth  from    heaven.''     It   is  an  article  of 

modern    folk-lore    at    Rome,    that    on    the    vigil    of 

Ascension  Day  Christ  descends  to  change  the  water 

into  milk  in  the  swelling  ears  of  corn.*^     This  belief 

has  evidentl}-  no  relation   to  the  Event   the  Church 

1  N.H.,  xxix.  6.  -  Ibid.,  xi.  28  ;  ix.  31. 

^  Ibid.,  XXX.  II.  ^  Macrob.,  Sat.,  i.  21. 

'■'  Somn.  Scip.,  \.  12. 

"  Coi  ricie  della  Sera  (Milan),  21  May  1909. 


360  Florence  Past  and  Present 

celebrates.     It  agrees   however  with   the  doctrine  of 

Macrobius,  and  must  have  been  attracted,  how  one 

cannot    sa}%   to    Ascension    Day    from    midsummer  : 

plainly    its    true   date.     So   the  grillo   of  the   same 

solstice  is  now  caught  by  the  Florentines  on  Ascension 

Day,   and   they   prepare   for  the   chase    by   drinking 

milk  :  perhaps  once  a  s}-mpathetic  charm  directed  to 

secure  the  sweet  influences  of  the  \^ia  Lactca,  and  fill 

the    swelling    corn.      We    follow    the    lead    of    these 

multiplied  indications,  and  turn  to  the  consideration 

of  midsummer   da\'   as    the    real    root   of  the  whole 

matter. 

The    24th    of    June,    once    the    summer    solstice, 

is    still    observed    at    Florence    as    the    day    of    San 

Giovanni,  and  with  marked  solemnity,  as  the  birthday 

of  her  patron  saint.      He  has  succeeded  in  this  office 

to  Santa  Reparata  ;  and  here  at  least  in   Florentine 

Christianity,  as  ever  in  her   paganism,  one  sees  the 

female  object  of  worship  for  once  gi\  ing  place  to  the 

male.     Outside  the  Churches,  the  features  of  the  day 

are  soon  described  ;    they  now  consist  of  banquets, 

public  or  private,  and  a  fine  display  of  fireworks  from 

the  Carraia  bridge;^  as  it  were  to  hallow    the  river 

for  the  summer  bathing  which  now  begins.     To  enter 

the  water  before  this  date  ^\•ould  be  regarded  as  an 

irregularity.     Fire  and  water  then  may  be  taken  as 

the     ultimate    elements    of    the    observance ;     they 

^  Since  1827.  Before  this  date  they  were  shown  from  the  tower  of 
the  Palazzo  Vecchio  ;  two  years  ago  the  display  was  ordered  on  the 
Piazzale  Michelangiolo,  where  it  has  since  remained. 


The  Grille  and  Midsummer  ■;6i 


O' 


evidently  hold   this  place  by  their  proved  power  to 

survive   all  the  changes   that   time  has  seen  in  the 

manner  of  acknowledging  the  day. 

Those  who  would  see  what  the  feast  used  to  be  at 

Florence,  and    would   follow  its   constant  variety   in 

detail,   may  easily  do  so  in  the  pages  of  Cambiagi 

and  the  other  writers  who   have    published    on  this 

subject.^     Here  the  lost  features  of  what  was  once  the 

great  feast  of  the  Florentine  \'ear  ma)^  be  more  simply 

summed  up,  leaving  an}'  significant  detail  to  find  its 

own   place   in   the    illustrative  discussion    that   must 

follow.       Licence    was    a    chief    note    of    the    feast. 

Process    for   debt   was   stopped  ;    prisons   opened    to 

discharge  even  notorious  malefactors,  twelve  of  whom 

were  included  in  the  procession  of  the  day.-    Contadini 

crowded  the  town,  and  made  strangel)-  free  with  its 

high  places  ;  dancing  and  sporting  all  night  in  the 

great  hall  of  the  Palazzo  of  the  Signori,  as  if  all 

distinction  of  rank  were  for  ever  abolished,  as  indeed 

for  the  time  it  was.^     Bonfires  of  broom  burnt  at  dusk 

in    the    Piazza,    and    the    rough    ball    in    the    palace 

succeeded  to  a  still  ruder  leaping  about  these  flames  ; 

the    flight,    pursuit,    and     battle    in    which    burning 

brands  took  the  place  of  weapons.     In  the  morning 

these   fires   gave   way   to   the    Ceri  that   represented 

them  :    towers    of  wood    on    wheels,   not   unlike  the 

^  G.  Cambiagi,  Memorie   Istoriche,  Firenze,    1766  ;  G.  A.,   Cenui 
Storici,  1877  ;  C.  Guasti,  Le  Feste  di  San  Giovanni,  Firenze,  190S. 
^  Guasti,  op.  cit.,  pp.  7,  33,  94.      Cambiagi,  op.  cit.,  p.  148. 
■*  Cambiagi,  op.  cit. ,  p.  1 1 1 . 


o 


62  Florence  Past  and  Present 


Easter  fire-car,  moved  on  an  axis  by  men  within,  and 
covered  with  figures  of  animals,  fruit  and  flowers  :  all, 
in  short,  that  the  sun  sees  and  warms  in  his  dail)^ 
course.  These  Ceri  were  the  offerings  of  the  subject 
towns  in  the  Florentine  dominion,  and  from  places 
too  small  to  attempt  such  a  present  came  tribute  in 
kind,  very  often  in  the  form  of  fresh-caught  fish, 
or  reeds  from  the  marshes  ;  ^  representing  the  stream 
as  the  Ceri  represented  the  sun  and  his  fruits.  In 
the  great  days  of  Florentine  industry  and  trade,  a 
wonderful  show  of  brocades,  hung  out  before  the 
shops  in  For'  Santa  Maria,  drew  all  e}'es,  and  a  palio 
of  rich  stuff  was  the  prize  in  the  horse  race  that  closed 
the  feast.  This  race,  sometimes  run  with  riders, 
sometimes  without,  must  be  reckoned  among  the 
primitive  elements  here.  In  the  fourteenth  centur\'  it 
was  already  old  beyond  memory  of  man,  so  that  the 
Chronicle  ventures  to  ascribe  its  origin  to  the  time 
when  Florence  first  chose  the  Baptist  as  her  Patron.- 
In  realit}'  it  is  probably  much  older  ;  and  indeed,  to 
find  the  origin  of  these  observances,  we  must  turn 
from  Christianit}'  to  the  paganism  that  preceded  it. 

The  Kronia  of  Greece  is  the  festival  which  most 
nearly  resembles  that  of  San  Gioxanni  at  Florence. 
Athens  celebrated  the  Kronia  on  the  banks  of  the 
Ilissus,  just  as  Florence  feasted  her  saint  by  those  of 
the  Arno.  Another  correspondence  appears  in  the 
offering,  which  in  Greece,  as  at    l-'lorence,  seems  to 

^  Cambiagi,  op.  ci/.,  pp.  73,  152-3.  -  G.  Villani,  Croii.,  i.  60. 


The  Grille  and  Midsummer  363 

have  consisted  of  all  kinds  of  produce.  P'easting 
followed  the  sacrifice,  and  at  the  feast  masters  and 
servants  sat  down  together  ;  for  it  was  essentiall}'  the 
servants'  day,  when  an  unusual  licence  of  speech  and 
behaviour  was  permitted  them.  The  Kronia  fell  in 
summer,  and  was  in  fact  a  harvest  festival,  as  indeed 
one  might  have  guessed  from  the  sickle  that  Kronos 
holds  in  his  hand.  It  is  true  that  Athens  celebrated 
her  Kronia  in  Jul}',  but  in  the  Ionian  Calendar,  the 
month  called  Krotiion  corresponds  to  our  June.^ 
Here  then,  in  her  great  day,  Florence  is  seen  looking, 
not  to  Rome,  for  the  Roman  Saturnalia  fell  at  the 
solstice  of  winter,  nor  even  to  Athens,  where  the 
feast  was  held  in  July,  but  to  that  further  Greece  in 
Asia  which  lay  at  the  doors  of  the  immemorial  East. 
One  point  of  great  importance  remains  undecided  : 
how  can  the  present  Patron  ol  Florence  be  related  to 
the  Greek  Kronos,  the  god  whose  place  he  seems  to 
have  taken  ?  The  answer  is  simpler  than  might  have 
seemed  possible.  Beginning  with  the  Baptist,  we 
know  that  his  birthday  was  fixed  for  the  24th  of 
June,  as  that  of  Christ  was  made  to  fall  at  the  winter 
solstice,  on  a  fantastic  interpretation  of  the  words  of 
St.  John  "  He  must  increase  but  I  must  decrease."  - 
There  can  thus  be  no  doubt  that  those  who  thus 
twisted  the  text  saw  behind  St.  John  the  sun,  that  at 
the   solstice   of   summer   begins   his   annual    retreat 

1  Daremherg  et  Saglio,  Dicliomtaire,  s.z'.  '  Kronia.' 
-  Augustine,  Ser///.  287,  §4;  vol.  v.  (1692). 


364  Florence  Past  and  Present 

and  decline.  Now  it  is  equally  well  known  that  in 
modern  Greece  '  St.  Elia '  has  come  to  occupy  the 
place  of  the  old  Helios,  the  sun  god  ;  a  change  which 
evidently  depends  on  the  great  similarity  of  the  two 
names,  especiall}-  in  Greek. ^  The  latest  witness  to 
this  fact  wonders  who  '  St.  Elia '  can  be  :  Elijah  the 
prophet  or  another?-  But  surely  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  he  is  the  Baptist,  in  the  character  of 
*  Elias  that  was  for  to  come.'  ^  Thus  it  is  only 
necessary  to  remember  that  Kronos  was  but  another 
name  for  Helios  * — the  sun  at  a  point  of  time,  the 
sun  of  the  solstice — to  see  the  meaning  of  the  whole 
cycle  of  change  that  has  set  the  Baptist  at  Florence, 
as  elsewhere,  in  the  place  of  the  old  sun  god. 

Behind  St.  John  as  patron  stands  the  figure  of 
Santa  Reparata  who  preceded  him  in  this  office.  So 
in  paganism  too,  be  sure,  there  was  a  goddess,  older, 
one  might  almost  say,  than  the  sun  god,  the  male 
who  was  first  subordinate,  and  then  only  her  equal 
partner  before  he  came  to  the  strength  that  enabled 
him  to  supplant  her.  We  have  seen  her  already,  but 
to  see  her  here  at  the  solstice  a  short  digression  and 
new  approach  will  be  necessary. 

In  old  Rome  the  24th  of  June  was  kept  as  the 
day  of  Fortune,  when  she  was  worshipped  as 
expressly  For  tuna  Fort  is,  Fortune  at  her  best 
strength,  evidently  in  sympathy  with  the  sun  then  at 

^  Lawson,  op.  rit.,  p.  44.  "  Ibid.,  note. 

•*  Matt.  xi.  14.  ,  ,  '  Daiemberg  et  Saglio,  s.v.  '  Kronia.' 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  365 

his  height.^  Feasting  and  rustic  h'cence  marked  the 
day,  which  was  spent  by  the  banks  of  the  Tiber. 
How  shall  we  account  for  a  Greek  festival  at  Rome, 
and  a  date  borrowed,  not  so  much  from  Athens,  as 
from  Asia  Minor?  Very  simply,  when  Tuscany  is 
the  teacher.  As  we  know,  the  cult  of  Fortune  came 
hence,  brought  by  that  Tuscan  whom  the  Romans 
called  Servius  Tullius,  but  whose  real  name  was 
Mastarna."^  Arna  is  the  Tuscan  name  of  the  goddess 
we  seek  ;  no  wonder  if  she  was  worshipped  at  the 
height  of  the  year  in  the  town  of  Arnina,  and  by  the 
banks  of  the  Arno.  We  have  found  her  at  the 
Equinox  of  spring  already  saluted  as  Nortia,  or 
Fortuna,  in  the  hope  of  finding  her  early  favour. 
Now,  at  the  solstice,  she  has  come  to  her  strength, 
and  is  Fortuna  indeed,  Fortuna  Fortis  ;  the  goddess 
who,  having  brought  forth,  is  now  ready  to  bear 
home  :  the  mistress  of  the  harvest  feast. 

If  we  are  to  learn  anything  more  of  Fortuna  and 
her  inevitable  companion  as  Florence  once  knew 
them,  this  knowledge  can  only  come  by  looking  more 
nearly  at  details.  Let  us  begin  with  what  is  most 
sure  ;  the  solemnity  of  the  day  in  its  general  character 
as  a  harvest  dinner,^     The  significant  detail   here  is 

'  Fowler,  op.  cit.,  pp.  161-172.  It  is  worth  notice  that  in  the 
ancient  East  the  sun  was  conceived  of  as  female  and  the  moon  as  male. 

-  See  Fowler,  op.  cit.,  pp.  75,  171,  200. 

^  The  sculptured  Calendar  on  the  facade  of  San  Martino,  Lucca, 
shows  June  as  the  harvest  month.  This  year  (1910)  reaping  was 
already  begun  near  Florence  on  June  25th.  For  the  following  details, 
see  Cambiagi,  op.  ctt,,  pp.  42,  121. 


366  Florence  Past  and  Present 

that  part  of  the  feast  which  seems  to  have  kept 
longest  what  one  may  call  a  ritual  form  and  sense  ; 
and  this  was  the  provision  made  for  the  poor  wretch 
who,  lashed  to  the  iron  that  rose  above  the  principal 
car,  was  carried  through  the  streets  to  represent  the 
main  figure  of  the  day,  the  Patron  and  Protector  of 
the  State.  The  car  stopped  in  its  course  opposite  a 
house  next  the  Church  of  Santa  Maria  in  Campo. 
From  the  windows  '  San  Giovanni '  received  a  large 
provision  of  food  and  wine.  Much  of  this  he  threw 
down  to  the  gaol-birds  that  formed  his  train,  but 
always  he  passed  his  arm  through  the  great  ciambella, 
keeping  that  for  himself.  This  was  a  sweet  cake 
specially  baked  for  the  occasion  in  the  oven  attached 
to  the  Campanile,  at  the  regular  price  of  half  a  piastre 
yearly  paid  by  the  State. 

In  the  western  Peloponnesus  sweet  cakes  were 
offered  in  the  same  way  to  one  whom  the  people 
recognised  in  like  manner  as  the  'protector  of  the 
State,'  and  as  he  seems  here  also  to  have  been  the 
companion  of  Fortuna,  this  Greek  rite  and  myth  may 
well  be  compared  with  the  practice  of  Florence.  The 
place  was  Elis,  the  god  Sosipolis — probably  a  form 
of  Kronos  or  Helios- — and  the  story  ran  as  follows. 
Elis  was  threatened  by  the  enem\'.  A  woman,  after- 
wards identified  as  the  goddess  Ilithyia,  appeared  offer- 
ing her  new-born  child  to  lead  the  town  to  victory. 
The  infant,  set  at  the  head  of  the  host,  showed  his 
power  by  a  sudden  prodigy.     He  became  a  serpent 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  367 

and  before  such  a  wonder  the  enemy  fled,  and  EHs 
was  safe.  The  name  SosipoHs  corresponds  exactly 
with  that  o{  Pherepolis,  given  by  Pindar  to  Tyche  or 
Fortuna,  and  Pausanias  records  at  least  one  case  in 
which,  at  Elis,  a  temple  of  Fortune  stood  beside  a 
smaller  shrine  dedicated  to  SosipoHs.  His  principal 
seat,  however,  where  the  sweet  cakes  were  offered,  lay 
under  the  hill  called  Kronios,  just  outside  the  temple 
of  Ilith)ia.  Thus  the  case  is  plain  ;  it  is  that  of  a 
god  who,  on  his  way  to  supplant  his  female  com- 
panion, begins  by  assuming  her  titles  and  even 
symbols.  Kronos  becomes  SosipoHs,  and  in  this 
character  Pausanias  saw  him  at  Elis  carrying  the 
very  cornucopia  of  Fortune  as  well  as  her  name.^ 
At  Florence  she  was  stronger,  and  retained  this 
symbol  even  to  our  own  time  in  her  quality  as 
Abundantia,  the  goddess  of  the  market  pillar. 

Passing  from  Greece  to  Italy,  we  find  the  same 
m)'th  witnessed  to  b\'  the  same  symbols.  Hard!}-  more 
than  a  year  ago  excavation  at  the  Lucus  Furrina;  on 
the  Roman  Janiculum  brought  to  light  the  remains 
of  a  temple  of  the  sun.  In  the  secret  cavit)-  of  the 
altar  lay  a  bronze  figure  of  a  goddess,  with  a  serpent, 
also  of  bronze,  twined  about  her  bod)-.  P>e  the 
cavity  was  closed  some  priestly  hand  had  set  a  fresh 
hen's  Q^g  in  each  fold  of  the  serpent's  coils  as  the 
supreme  dedication  of  the  deposit.  The  goddess  is 
the  Dea  Syria,  the  Atargatis  ;  identified  as  such  by 

^   For  all  this  mythology  and  ritual,  see  Pausanias,  vi.  20,  etc. 


368  Florence  Past  and  Present 

an  inscription  found  on  the  spot,  and  referring  to  this 
very  figure,  in  which  she  is  called  by  her  Roman 
name  of  Fortuna.^  So  Calabria  still  bakes  to  this 
day  a  sweet  cake — I  have  just  seen  a  specimen  at 
Florence  - — wreathed  round  in  the  form  of  two  snakes 
with  head  and  tail  complete,  and  carrying  eggs 
deeply  set  in  the  paste,  one  in  each  space  that  the 
snakes  leave  between  their  folds.  The  general  form 
of  the  cake  is  just  that  of  the  Florentine  Ciambella. 
Are  we  to  think  of  the  cake  offered  on  the  24th  of 
June  to  the  '  Protector  of  the  City  '  as  once  made 
serpent-wise  like  this,  or  ma\'  we  not  rather  suppose 
that  it  was  as  often  plain  though  sweet  ;  ^  Fortuna, 
the  Protectress,  keeping  her  snakes  to  herself  as  we 

^  See  P.  Gauckler,  Le  couple  Heliopolitain,  in  Melanges  .  .  . 
de  r Ecole  Fraitcaise  (Rome,  1909)  ;  also  C.  A',  de  V Acadcmie  des 
Inscriptions  (Paris,  1909),  and  M.  M.  Nicole  et  Darnier,  Le 
Sanctiiaire  des  Dieiix  Oricnta/rx  (Rome  :  Cuggiani,  1909). 

-  In  the  Museo  di  Etnografia  Italiana. 

•''  The  subject  of  Florentine  festival-cakes  is  interesting  and  difficult. 
Fagiuoli,  the  satiric  poet,  in  his  J<!i/ne  (vi.  91)  notes  that  con/or/ini, 
as  well  as  ciamhelle,  were  baked  for  San  Giovanni.  Can  it  be  that 
their  name  alludes  to  that  of  Fortuna  Fortis  ?  As  they  are  elsewhere 
called  capi  di  lalte  and,  more  plainly,  mavimelle,  it  would  seem  they 
sometimes,  like  the  pointed  stones  of  Tamuli  in  Sardinia,  bore  the 
open  sign  of  the  motiier-goddess.  These  f/taiiifnelle  are  no  doubt  the 
Greek  niazai,  cf.  Athen.,  JJcip.  iii.  29;  iv.  12.  They  seem  to  have 
been  a  speciality  of  Phigalia.  Once  the  confortinaio  set  up  a  branch 
of  laurel  before  his  sho]3-door  on  feast  days,  hanging  it  with  these 
confortitii  in  many  shapes.  Even  now  huctellati^  a  small  crisp  form  of 
the  ciambelle,  are  commonly  sold  in  the  streets  of  Florence  from  a 
'tree,'  on  whose  twigs  they  are  strung.  See  the  authorities  cited  in 
the  della  Crusca  Vocal/olario,  s.v.  ciambella  and  conforiini,  and  the 
chap-book  Satire,  dcttati  e  Gergki,  published  by  A.  Salani  at 
Florence  in  18S6,  p.  12. 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer 


569 


know  she  kept  her  cornucopia  ?     That  she  had  them 
there  is  sure  evidence  to  show. 

The  bronze  Fortuna  with  her  serpent  found  of  late 
at  Rome  has  been  identified,  across  many  centuries 
of  intervening  time,  with  the  very  ancient  goddess  of 
Crete  who  holds  serpents  in  her  hands.^  But  while  the 
Roman  example  is  comparatively  recent,  dating  only 
from  the  later  Empire,  another  is  at  hand  much  more 


COIN    OF   THEZI.I    WITH    SERTENT-GODDESS 
(By  kind  permission  of  the  Delegates  of  the  Clarendon  Press) 


to  our  purpose,  since  it  not  onl)-  copies  more  exactly 
the  Cretan  type,  but  approaches  nearer  it  in  time,  and 
in  place  tou  :hes  Florence  very  closely.  There  is  a 
little  group  of  early  Italic  coins,  all  found  at  Vulci  or 
Caere,  and  all  bearing  for  epigraph  the  place  name 
THEZI  or  THEZLI,  which  Deeke  has  identified  with 
Fiesole.  Pais  describes  them  as  modelled  on  the 
money  of  Elis  in  the  fifth  century  before  our  era."^ 
Now   some  of  these  coins  show  '  a  running  Gorgon, 

^   P.  Gauckler,  op.  cit.,  p.  60. 

-  E.  Pais,  'L'Origine  deijli  Elruschi '  in  Sludii  Storici  {V\sa,  1893), 
ii.  pp.  49-87. 

2  A 


2,yo  Florence  Past  and  Present 

holding  in  each  hand  a  serpent '  :  ^  evidently  the 
Cretan  goddess  in  the  form  in  which  she  first  reached 
Italy  and  became  known  at  Florence.  Remembering 
'  San  Gorgone,'  and  where  those  work  who  still  call 
on  his  name,  we  ma\'  take  this  figure  as  the  oldest 
representation  of  his  consort  Arna,  the  mother-god- 
dess of  the  Villa  Arnina.  To  see  the  last,  one  need 
only  visit  the  Convent  Church  of  Santa  Verdiana  in 
the  Florentine  street  of  the  same  name.  In  her 
pictures  this  saint  stands  between  two  upright  snakes, 
of  which  the  legend  says  that  they  were  her  constant 
companions.  Her  name  spells  the  spring,  and  indeed 
she  would  seem  to  keep  the  secret  of  eternal  youth. 
In  three  thousand  years  this,  the  strong  Fortune  of 
Florence,  has  not  changed,  nor  suffered  any  to  take 
from  her  here  the  twin  serpents  that  she  first  grasped 
so  long  ago  !     •  ' 

The  risk  she  ran  was  great,  for  at  Florence  Fortune 
lived  in  close  company  with  the  great  robber  of  such 
things.-  To  see  who  this  was,  we  must  look  awa}' 
from  the  food  to  the  fire,  the  central  clement  in  this 
Florentine  feast. 

Even  to-day,  the  fireworks  of  Florence  give  the 
signal  for  the  lighting  up  of  the  hills  all  along  the 
Val  d'Arno  on  .St.  John's  eve,  and  in  the  capital 
itself,  long    after  gunpowder   had    come   to   play    its 

^  Head,  Historia  Nnmoritm,  p.  12. 

-  See,  for  the  attempt,  L.  Passerini,   Ciiriosita,  ii.  Serie   (Firenze, 
1875),  P-  42- 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer 


o7 


blazing,  blinding  tricks  from  the  tower  of  Palazzo 
Vecchio,  below  in  the  Piazza  unsophisticated  fires  of 
broom  kept  their  place,  and  continued  what  must 
have  been  the  more  primitive  usage.  These  fires  were 
what  the  '  ceri '  of  the  day  came  later  to  represent, 
in  a  form  less  perishable  and  more  spectacular.  The 
ceri  resembled  pyres  ;  but  were  meant  for  ornament 
rather  than  for  use. 

The  same  may  be  said  of  the  car  of  St.  John,  the 
central  feature  of  the  great  procession.  As  one  reads 
the  description  of  it  in  the  pages  of  Cambiagi,^  one 
sees  clearly  that  it,  like  the  others,  was  merely  a 
developed  '  cero,'  looking  back,  as  the  ceri  themselves 
did,  to  an  original  in  the  ritual  fires  of  the  Piazza. 
'  Brindellone,'  as  the  car  with  its  figure  was  called, 
stood  on  a  square  platform  set  on  four  massive  wheels, 
and  rose  above  it  in  four  decreasing  stories  so  as  to 
present  the  form  of  a  true  pyramid,  the  permanent 
figure  of  the  ritual  pyre.  On  the  first  story,  in  front 
of  the  car,  a  niche  was  contrived,  where  a  boy  dressed 
in  lamb-skins  stf)od  for  the  saint  of  the  day.  On  the 
very  summit  of  the  fourth  stor}%  and  at  top  of  all,  a 
padded  iron  held  in  his  place  the  man  about  whom 
the  whole  ceremony  gathered  force  and  sense.  It 
the  car  represented  a  pyre,  tiiis  man  can  only  have 
stood  for  the  victim.  He  too  was  called  '  San 
Giovanni '  indeed,  but  must  surely  once  have  borne 
another   name  :  the   more  that,  were  he   really    and 

^   Cambiagi,  c/.  fit.,  pp.  40-42,  120. 


372  Florence  Past  and  Present 

originally  such,  the  part  of  the  saint  would  here  be 
doubled.     Who  can  he  have  been  ? 

In  Greek  mytholog)'  it  is  Hercules  who  ends  his 
life  in  this  way,  tearing  desperately  at  the  shirt  of 
Nessus,  and  casting  himself  on  the  flames  of  the 
burning  pyre.  '  Brindellone,'  we  are  told,  means 
literally  the  '  tatterdemalion,'  and  more  precisely  '  he 
that  affects  rags  rather  willingly  than  of  necessity.'  ^ 
Can  it  be  that  this  man  once  took  his  place  on  that 
car  which  was  a  pyre  that  there  he  might  play  the 
part  of  the  ancient  hero  ?  We  have  already  found 
Fortuna  as  the  corn-goddess  of  Tarsus,  but  there  she 
had  a  male  companion  whom  the  Greeks  identified 
with  Hercules.  This  god  was  worshipped  as  the 
founder  of  the  cit}',  and  its  coins  show  his  figure  pro- 
jected on  the  background  of  a  conical  pyre  resting  on 
a  square  base.  It  is  known  that  Tarsus  celebrated 
him  by  building  and  kindling  a  pyre  from  time  to  time 
in  his  honour,  and  that  a  similar  ceremony,  often 
involving  the  burning  of  the  god  in  effigy,  came  west, 
and  was  observed  not  only  at  T}'re,  where  it  seems 
to  have  originated,  or  at  Tarsus,  but  in  the  Tyrian 
colonies  of  Carthage  and  of  distant  Cadiz  as  well. 
The  Phcenicians  called  the  god  Melcarth,  as  they 
called  the  goddess  'Atheh,  and  a  Maltese  inscription 
makes  it  certain  that  Melcarth  was  identified  b\'  the 
Greeks  with  Hercules.- 

'   Seethe  yocaMario  of  KigiiUm-h'anfani,  s.7'. 

"  See,  passim,  the  chapter  '  The  hiirnini^  of  IMelcartli  '  in   Frazer, 
Adonis,  pp.  84-90,  and  ibid.,  pp.  13,  99. 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  373 

Now,  as  to  Florence,  it  is  remarkable  that  a  like 
legend  ascribed  the  foundation  of  this  city  to  the 
eastern  Hercules.  Borghini  and  Lami,  who  trace  the 
tale  no  farther  back  than  the  time  and  authority — late 
and  doubtful  indeed — of  Annius  Viterbensis,  seem 
themselves  lost  in  a  dream. ^  They  forgot  that  the 
fact  to  be  investigated  was  not  the  reality  of  a  m}th, 
but  the  date  of  its  appearance  ;  and  they  ignored  the 
testimony  of  the  public  seal  of  Florence,  which,  long 
before  the  days  of  the  Viterban  forger,  bore  the  figure 
of  Hercules  as  the  device  of  the  city.-  The  name  of 
Premilcore  too,  if,  as  seems  possible,  it  preserve  that 
of  Melcarth  among  the  Tuscan  hills  of  the  Florentine 
province,  would  definitely  indicate  that  Hercules  was 
known  here  in  his  Phrenician  form.^  So  too  in  Elis 
we  find  the  record  of  a  '  pratum  solis  '  which  Hercules 
appropriated.*  On  the  seal  of  Florence  Hercules  is 
known  as  such  by  the  lion-skin  he  wears,  and  this 
symbol  of  the  god  has  proved  more  lasting  than  the 
god  himself;  it  survives  at  Palazzo  Vecchio  to-day 
in  full  animal  form  as  the  famous  Marzocco,  the 
guardian  lion  of  the  city,  carved  in  stone  under  the 
vaults  of  the  central  basement,  or  lifted  on  high  in 
pierced  iron  to  adorn  the  vane  of  Arnolfo's  tower. 
Once  the  Marzocco  stood  outside,  on  the  ringliiera  in 

^  Borghini,  Discorsi,  i.  pp.  14-17  ;  Lami,  Lezioni,  pp.  259-61. 
"  Passerini,  op.  cit.,  pp.  37-46. 

^  Other  forms  are  Primalocore,  Primalcorium  and  Primalcore.     See 
Repetti,  Diz.  della  Toscana,  iv.  pp.  670-71. 
^  Pausanias,  v.  13. 


374  Florence  Past  and  Present 

front  of  the  palace,  and  this  hon  was  solemnly  crowned 
in  gold  once  a  year  for  the  24th  of  June.^  So,  too,  the 
central  human  figure  of  the  day,  the  man  that  the 
great  car  bore  through  the  city,  wore  a  crown.'  This 
adornment,  hardly  appropriate  to  a  saint  who  sought 
the  desert  rather  than  '  kings'  palaces,'  definitely 
connects  the  human  figure  with  the  symbolic  animal. 
By  this  lion,  he  can  only  be  Hercules  ;  as  his  car  can 
only  be,  at  Florence  as  at  Tarsus,  the  pyre  of  the 
eastern  god. 

Where  did  Hercules  get  his  lion  ?  He  was 
essentially  the  bully  of  antiquity,  always  killing  or 
robbing  ;  and  the  probability  is  he  stole  it  from  some 
one  else.  He  was  the  essential  male,  and  the 
primaeval  female  therefore  appears  as  his  probable 
victim.  In  Greek  story  he  gathers  in  himself  what 
once  belonged  to  many  forgotten  heroes,  but  behind 
the  Greek  Hercules  lies  the  older  eastern  god  with 
which  he  was  identified,  and  the  Hercules  of  the  east 
represents,  even  more  definitely,  the  same  victory  of 
the  male  over  the  female,  the  god  over  the  goddess  : 
a  change  that  was  inevitable,  as  society  itself  passed 
from  the  matriarchal  to  the  patriarchal  form.  Now 
at  Pteria  in  Asia  Minor,  and  Hierapolis  in  Syria — to 
name  no  other  sites — it  is  the  Atargatis,  the 
Fortuna,  who  rides  or  stands  on  a  lion,  the  symbol 
of  strength.^     When  therefore   the    coins  of  Tarsus 

'   Cambiagi,  op.  ,it.,  ji.   II2.  -  Ibid.,  p.  43. 

'  Macrob.,  Sat.,  i.  23. 


LION    FROM    THE    CIPFUS   OF    SAN    TOMMASO 

(Kindly  photographed  for  this  book 
by  the  experts  of  the  Kluseo  Archeologico,  Florence) 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  ^']'] 

show  us  her  male  companion  thus  supported 
and  attended  we  know  what  this  means.^  Hercules 
has  begun  his  career  of  robbery,  and  the  goddess 
is  his  first  victim.  So  at  Florence  too  he  appears 
with  that  lion  which  not  only  declares  the  god,  but, 
as  booty  snatched  from  Fortuna  Fortis,  defines  his 
real  character.  He  represents  an  age  in  which  man 
had  begun  to  take  the  place  once  held  by  woman. 
How  far  will  he  go  in  Tuscany  ;  even  there  he  has 
the  lion,'  will  he  appropriate  the  serpents  as  well  ? 
Thus,  at  least  in  Greece,  he  seized  them,  one  in  each 
hand,  from  his  cradle  ;  not  only  claiming  the  attribute, 
but  even  mocking  from  birth  the  very  attitude 
of  the  goddess  who  used  to  hold  them  so.''  To  see 
how  the  matter  passed  we  must  leave  the  city  for  a 
moment,  and  make  a  short  excursion  into  the  Tuscan 


^  See  Frazer,  Adonis,  pp.  lOO,  102,  106. 

"  The  earliest  known  form  of  the  INIarzocco  appears  on  the  stele  of 
San  Tommaso  in  the  Museo  Archeologico.  The  lion  is  here  already 
associated  with  the  sun-god  '  Usil  Aplu,'  and  is  so  archaic  and  eastern 
in  type  as  to  recall  distinctly  the  sculptures  of  Asia  Minor.  There,  at 
Ayazium  and  Arslan-kaia,  we  find  the  original  of  the  w(j/(/of  the  twin 
lions  and  central  pillar  so  well  known  from  its  later  appearance  over 
the  Lion  Gate  of  Mycenae.  At  the  latter  Asiatic  site  the  pediment 
under  which  the  lions  appear  is  crowned  by  the  twin-serpents  of  the 
mother-goddess.  At  Florence,  in  the  example  just  cited,  the  stele 
itself  is  the  pillar,  and  the  lions  guard  it  still,  one  carved  on  each  of 
the  two  opposite  faces.  Of  the  two  remaining  sides  one  has  the  image 
of  the  sun-god,  and  the  other  a  winged  griffin  which,  to  judge  from 
the  THEZLi  coins,  may  represent  the  goddess.  For  the  Asiatic 
examples,  see  Perrot  et  Chipiez,  v.  p.  no,  etc. 

"^  Even  in  the  caJuceus,  each  point  where  the  twin  serpents  inter- 
laced was  known  as  the  'nodus  llerculis.'     See  Macrob.,  Sat.,  i.  19. 


378  Florence  Past  and  Present 

country  ;  but  a  brief  day's  journey  from  the  gates  of 
Florence. 

The  birthplace  of  Santa  Verdiana,  in  whom  we 
have  found  the  last,  the  remaining,  representative  of 
the  ancient  goddess,  lies  at  Castelfiorentino  in  the 
Val  d'Elsa.  A  hamlet  near  by  is  still  called  Lungo- 
tuono  ;  ^  an  ominous  name,  recalling  as  it  does  the 
doubly  rolling  peal  of  thunder  that  announced  and 
accompanied  the  birth  of  Hercules.  Yet  if  the  god  is 
here  he  does  not  prevail.  The  legend  of  the  saint 
tells  how  her  familiar  snakes  were  attacked  ;  how  the 
men  of  the  place  rose  against  them  ;  how  soldiers 
pursued  and  mutilated  them  ;  how  the  saint  resisted  ; 
put  forth  her  power  ;  healed  their  wounds,  restored 
their  full  form  ;  retained  them  for  herself."'  Another 
neighbouring    name,    that  of  Celiaula,    where   Santa 

^  See  Repetti,  op.  cit.,  i.  p.  539. 

"  F.  L.  Giacomini,  Vila  dcUa  gloriosa  vergine  S.  Verdiana 
(Firenze,  1692),  pp.  48-53.  How  a  daughter  of  the  Attavanti  in  the 
early  thirteenth  century  stepped  into  the  place  of  the  earth-goddess 
and  appropriated  her  symbols — the  mystic  cista  and  the  snakes  that, 
once  concealed  there,  have  issued  from  it — were  a  tale  too  long  and 
obscure  for  a  mere  note.  The  root  of  the  matter  lies  in  the  occasional 
ceremony  of  the  \'er  Sacrum  (Festus,  Dc  Verb.  Sig.,  p.  379),  when 
under  calamity  the  young  were  Teileci  and  banished  to  bring  in  pio- 
sperity  as  soon  as  they  came  to  ripe  age.  We  may  think  of  a  Vcr 
Dianae  sacrum  then  ;  remembering  the  famine  at  Castelfiorentino  with 
which  the  Legend  of  the  Saint  opens,  the  help  she  brought  the  starving 
people  and  her  voluntary  assumption  of  the  veil  in  a  cell  outside  the 
walls.  Note  also  that  the  ancient  word  A/^^the  earth,  was  preserved 
in  the  ritual  of  the  Ephesian  Diana  (Clem.  Alex.,  Strom.,  1.  5  ^<^' 
Paris,  p.  568)  and  gives  the  liknon,  the  specific  form  of  cista  so  often 
used  to  contain  the  fruits  of  the  earth  and  the  sacred  snakes  in  the 
mysteries  of  Greece. 


S.    VERDIANA,    AS   SME  APPEARS   OX    HER    HOUSE 
AT   CASTELFIORENTINO 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  381 

Verdiana  has  a  place  on  the  high  altar,  and  much 
reverence,  ma}'  possibly  hold  the  secret  of  a  further 
triumph  of  Fortuna  Fortis — the  goddess  who  defied 
the  all-conquering  god.  For,  in  this  name,  '  Celi ' 
readily  becomes  on  a  Tuscan  tongue  '  Ceri,'  ^  and 
'  Ceriaula  '  is  near  enough  to  the  Ciraiili  registered  by 
Pitre  to  warrant  serious  attention  to  what  he  says 
under  that  head.-  The  Ciraiili,  then,  are  known  in 
Sicily  as  people  belonging  to  different  families,  but 
distinguished  by  this  additional  name  because  all 
have  the  power  of  healing  those  whom  serpents  have 
bitten.  The  name  indeed  seems  to  have  been  derived 
from  the  Greek  verb  K-jyAen-,  to  charm  serpents  by 
music.  Thus  at  Celiaula,  if  we  are  not  mistaken,  the 
goddess  would  seem  to  have  delegated  her  power  to 
her  priests,  and  thence  to  have  sent  them  forth  to 
play  in  Tuscany  the  part  of  healers.  At  Rome,  on 
the  other  hand,  such  men  were  known  as  Marsi,  for 
there  Fortuna  was  not  so  much  Fortis  as  in  her  own 
Tuscan  seat,  and  the  Mars  or  Mas — the  essential 
male  power — had  come  to  take  her  place  in  this 
particular.  Remember  that  he  who  brought  her 
south  was  Mast-Arna,  or  Arna's  man  as  the  name  may 
probably  be  rendered,  and  that  the  planet  Mars  was 
also  known  to  the  ancients  as  the  star  of  Hercules.^ 

'   Giacomini  in  fact  registers  the  form  Ciricciavoli ;  op.  cil.,  p.  326. 

-  G.  Pitre,  Ctuiosita  di  Usi  Popo/aii  (Catania,  1902),  pp.  146-9. 
See  also  his  Archivio,  i.  pp.  76  seq.  (Palermo,  18S2),  and  his  Usi  e 
Costumi,  iv.  pp.  212  seq. 

3  Pliny,  N.H.,  ii.  8;  Macrob. .  Sat.,  iii.   12. 


382  Florence  Past  and  Present 

The  place  held  by  Mars  at  Florence,  if  not  supreme, 
was  at  least  very  important.  Villa  Camarte  joined 
the  Villa  Arnina  to  found  the  city,  as  it  were  in  a 
ritual  union  of  the  goddess  and  the  god.  The  Church 
where  '  San  Giovanni '  stayed  his  progress  to  eat  and 
distribute  the  ritual  meal  was  '  in  Campo ' ;  that  is  in 
Camarte.^  San  Giovanni  itself,  the  Baptistery  of 
Florence,  was  also  'in  Camarte."-^  Villani  says  this 
Church  was  first  built  as  a  Temple  of  Mars  ;  that  it 
was  left  open  above  after  the  manner  of  the  Roman 
Pantheon,  and  that  the  statue  of  the  god  stood  beneath 
this  opening  on  a  pillar  set  in  the  centre  of  the 
building.^  This  pillar,  according  to  Vasari,  still  stands 
as  one  of  the  supports  of  the  architrave  under  the 
first  galler)',  having  been  set  there  to  replace  another 
of  granite  removed  to  be  the  Column  of  the  Mercato 
Vecchio,  where  it  carried  the  statue  of  Abundance 
with  her  cornucopia.^  Thus  again,  by  such  inter- 
change, the  goddess  comes  into  near,  though  acci- 
dental, relation  with  the  god.  That  there  was  a 
'  Balneum  Martis '  close  to  the  Baptistery  is  sure,^ 
and  that  the  Church  itself  has  taken  the  place  of  a 
temple  of  the  god  is  therefore  probable.  Mars,  we 
repeat,  was  the  male  par  cxcclloicc ;  the  equivalent 
of  the  eastern  Hercules,  the  consort  of  Fortuna. 
That    his    name   and   worship   were    associated    with 

1  I.ami,  Lezioiii,  p.  58.  -  //•/(/.,  p.  84. 

^  G.  Villani,  Cro/i.,  i.  42. 

■*  Vi/e  (ed.  Milanesi,  1878),  ii.  400.     See  above,  p.  no. 
^  Lami,  op.  cii.,  46. 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  383 

Fortuna's  high  day,  even  the  present  Baptistery 
affords  some  evidence.  Of  the  zodiac  still  visible 
in  the  pavement  Villani  says  : — '  We  have  it  on 
ancient  authority  that  the  figure  of  the  sun  inlaid 
with  cement,  and  inscribed,  '  En  giro  torte  sol  ciclos, 
et  rotor  igne,'  was  astrologically  laid  here  ;  for  when 
the  sun  enters  Cancer  he  shines  at  noon  on  this  spot 
through  the  opening  in  the  roof  where  the  lantern  is  ; 
but  does  so  at  no  other  time  of  year.'  ^  Now  the 
first  point  of  Cancer  corresponds  to  the  24th  of 
June  as  Florence  reckoned  it.  The  very  inscription 
is  contrived  to  read  as  well  backwards  as  forwards, 
as  it  were  in  sympathy  with  the  sun  himself  as  he 
retreats  from  the  solstice  onwards.  His  involved 
course  through  the  Zodiac  is  what  the  word  torte 
insists  upon  ;  it  is  the  *  serpent's  path,'  which 
Macrobius  so  names  in  the  very  chapter  where  he 
notes  the  tendency  of  the  god  to  assume  the  attributes 
and  the  appearance  of  Mars.- 

The  feast,  so  far  as  it  meant  eating  and  drinking, 
has  occupied  our  attention  long  enough,  nor  is  it 
necessary  to  insist  further  on  what  may  be  called 
the  first  aspect  of  that  fire  which  was  so  natural  an 
element  of  sun-worship.  W^e  therefore  choose  this 
moment  to  pass  to  the  other  :  that  in  which  fire 
becomes  involved  with  the  water  that  surely  plays 
its  own  part  here.  The  goddess  Arna  was,  even  nom- 
inally, in  relation  with  the  stream  that  flowed  through 

1  G.  Villani,  Croit.,  i.  60.  -  Macrob.,  Sa/..  i.  i"],  passim. 


384  Florence  Past  and  Present 

Florence.  The  Baptist  himself  had  a  connection 
with  water  that  needs  no  further  emphasis.  The 
fires  of  the  solstice  came  to  be  kindled  at  last 
on  the  bridge,  as  once  no  doubt  they  burned 
first  on  the  banks  of  the  Arno  or  shone  from 
fire-boats  that  the  river  bore  on  its  very  bosom. 
How  are  we  to  understand  the  combination,  on 
such  a  day,  of  elements  apparently  so  contrary  and 
irreconcilable? 

It  may  be  well  to  recall  here,  even  more  exactly 
than  we  have  yet  done,  the  dress  and  appearance  of 
the  chief  actor  in  the  festival  ;  the  man  who  looked 
down  on  the  people  from  the  height  of  the  car  of  San 
Giovanni.  We  know  that  he  was  crowned  as  a  king, 
we  have  not  yet  noticed  that  the  fountain  of  Florence 
ran  wine,  and  that  the  king  was  dressed,  front  and 
back,  in  two  tiger-skins  buttoned  down  the  sides, 
while  his  throne,  or  pyre,  was  drawn  through 
Florence  by  oxen.^  But,  b)'  all  these  signs  together 
this  is  Bacchus,  the  Dionysus  of  the  Greeks,  to  whom 
the  tiger  was  constantly  given,  and  the  ox  as  well, 
on  a  legend  that  he  first  yoked  this  animal  to  the 
plough.-  Yet  the  day  tells  us  that  he  must,  in  fact, 
have  represented,  not  the  Bacchus  of  the  west  but 
the  sun  god  ;  probably  after  some  ancient  eastern 
fashion  such  as  that  of  Hierapohs  in  Syria,  where 
the  male  consort  of   Fortune  appeared  seated  upon 

'  Cambiagi,  op.  liL,  pp.  42,  123. 
-  riutarcli,  ('.A'.,  145. 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  385 

bulls. ^  Is  there  any  reason  to  think  that  the  god 
ever  came  west  in  any  such  form  ? 

The  cemetery  of  Tarquinii,  near  the  modern 
Corneto,  has  yielded,  from  one  of  its  tombs,  no  less 
than  eleven  examples  of  a  circular  bronze  plaque 
bearing  the  unmistakable  type  of  which  we  are  in 
search  :  the  Oriental  Bacchus,  bearded  to  exaggera- 
tion,  and  horned  too,  for  he  has  borrowed  this  detail 
from  his  symbolic  ox.-  The  golden  bronze  of  the 
circular  disk  behind  gives  his  head  the  air  of 
looking  out  from  the  sun  itself,  which  he  in  fact 
represented.  Tarquinii  lay  at  those  gates  of  the 
south-western  sea-board  by  which  the  Etruscans 
first  entered  Tuscany  :  it  was  the  point  from  which 
eastern  cults  early  made  their  way  up  country,  carried 
b)'  this  conquest  and  prevailing  civilisation. 

This  Bacchus,  then,  represents  the  sun,  but  in  what 
activity  ?  Macrobius  is  explicit  here,  not  only  describ- 
ing the  bearded  figure  of  the  sun-god  at  the  Syrian 
Heliopolis  as  habited  like  a  Mars,  and  attended 
by  a  female  companion  whom  a  serpent  enclosed,^ 
but  proceeding  immediately  thereafter  to  a  distinction 
in  which  Liber  Pater,  the  bearded  Bacchus,  is 
declared  as  the  sun  of  the  night,  the  sun,  that  is,  in 
his  subterranean    course,    when    he    still  moves   and 

^  Frazer,  Adonis,  p.  130. 

^  See  Bui/.  1st.  Corr.  Arch.,  ad  ann.  1829,  p.  150.  One  is  figured 
by  Dennis  in  his  Cities  and  Cemeteries  of  Etritria,  who  reports  that 
they  are  preserved  in  the  Gregorian  JNIuseum  at  Rome. 

•*  Sat.,  i.  17,  ad  calcem. 

2  B 


o 


86  Florence  Past  and  Present 


works  though  withdrawn  from  the  eyes  of  men.  He 
determines  the  strength  and  chief  observance  of  the 
god  to  fall  at  the  summer  solstice,  in  sign  of  which 
his  beard  is  seen  fully  grown  ;  and  describes  his  Thra- 
cian  Temple  as  round,,  with  a  hole  in  the  roof  open 
to  the  sky.^  We  know  why  San  Giovanni  had  his 
feast  at  midsummer,  and  can  now  understand  Villani's 
description  of  his  Church  at  Florence  as  once  open 
to  the  sky  in  the  midst ;  the  chronicler  was  applying 
to  a  Christian  Church  the  still  living  tradition  of  the 
pagan  temple  of  the  sun  that  the  Camarte  of  which 
he  speaks  had  once  built  on  or  near  the  same  site. 

This  conception  of  the  secret,  or  nightly,  sun  is  one 
worth  development.  To  early  man  every  sunset  and 
every  solstice  of  summer  brought  the  same  problem  : 
where  did  the  sun  go  when  he  sank  ;  how  was  his 
return  prepared  ;  from  what  depths,  and  by  what 
channels,  did  his  force  and  heat,  that  dated  their 
annual  decline  from  midsummer,  still  reach  the  earth 
and  make  it  fertile  ? 

If  the  East  first  proposed  the  answer,  it  was  in  the 
West  that  her  children  found  it ;  pushing  their 
voyages  till  the  limits  of  the  land  were  reached  and 
the  ultimate  sunset  seen.  The  furthest  truth  open 
to  such  observation  was  evidently  this,  that  the  sun  in 
his  setting  sought  the  water,  fell  into  the  RJica — the 
ocean  stream — and  so,  men  quickly  supposed,  re- 
turned again  by  secret  channels  to  his  rising  point  in 
^  Sat.,  i.  1 8. 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  T^Sy 

the  East.  An  immediate  development  of  the  idea 
provided  that  boat  of  the  Sun  which  Hercules  was 
said  to  have  borrowed.^ 

Thus  it  was  at  the  Pillars  of  Hercules  that  the 
secret  was  learned,  and  where  water  appeared  as  the 
ultimate  vehicle  of  the  sun's  hidden  force.  When 
the  night  drew  her  veil  over  these  fires,  the\'  burned 
still,  it  was  thought,  in  a  hundred  springs.  When 
Cancer  came,  and  the  sun  began  his  annual  retreat, 
the  meaning  of  that  withdrawal  lay  open  ;  the  force 
that  heaven  lost  earth  gained,  in  every  rising  fountain 
and  flowing  river.  This  view  of  nature  was  confirmed 
to  man  b\'  man\'  facts  and  fancies  confounded 
together  in  a  common  misinterpretation.  Did  not 
the  great  river  of  Egypt  commence  its  rise  with  just 
that  solstice  which  opened  the  period  of  the  sun's 
decline  ?  -  The  fountain  of  Dodona,  the  Anapauo- 
menos,  did  it  not  move  in  .sympathy  with  the  hidden 
sun  ;  empty  by  day  but  full  at  midnight,  nay  full  of 
the  dark  sun's  fire,  for  it  even  kindled  torches  !  ■'  So 
Deles,  they  said,  had  a  spring  that  rose  and  fell  with 
the  Nile,  and  Tenedos  another,  which  ran  only  after 
the  summer  solstice.^  Of  fountains  that  intoxicated 
there  is  no  need  to  speak,  though  these  also  the 
ancients  believed   in,   pushing   to  this  extreme  point 

'  This  scyphtts  is  sometimes  called  a  boat,  sometimes  a  cup,  thus 
challenging  comparison  with  the  crater  of  the  solar  Bacchus.  See 
Macrobius,  Somn.  Scip.,  i.  I2  ;  Sat.,  v.  21. 

-  Plut.,  De  placitis  .  .  .   Philos.,  i.  i. 

3  Pliny,  N.H.,  ii.  103.  ^  Ibid. 


388       ■■*   Florence  Past  and  Present 

their  faith  in  that  Bacchus  who  was  once  the  sun 
god  and  only  later  the  god  of  the  vine.^  The  god 
Volcanus  too  entered  their  dream,  for  rivers  of  fire 
authentic  and  terrible,  earth  born,  could  only  seem 
to  them  the  ultimate,  and  now  dreadful,  effect  of 
these  secret  rays.  Kronos,  the  retreating  sun,-  may 
give  kiv/nios  the  waterspring,  which,  in  Pindar,  as  he 
describes  Etna,  becomes  the  stream  of  red-hot  lava 
that  Hephctstus  poured.-^  Under  this  solar  classifica- 
tion, fire  and  water,  bane  and  blessing,  are  brought 
together,  and  one  begins  to  understand  why  fish 
were  offered  from  the  Tiber  at  Rome  on  the  day  of 
Vulcan  ;  the  waters  rendering  tribute  to  the  dread 
form  of  the  god  of  fire  who  thus  possessed  them,  and 
the  worshippers  using  fire  as  the  means  of  making 
that  offering  complete.^ 

The  rise  of  the  Nile  was  perhaps  the  greatest  proof 
on  which  this  theory  of  the  hidden  sun  depended, 
and  the  lotos  of  the  Nile^  became  the  widespread 
symbol  of  the  secret  doctrine  for  a  very  special  reason, 
even  beyond  that  of  its  mere  habitat  in  so  sympathetic 
a  stream.  The  lotos  flower  was  round  and  red,  so 
that  it  fairl)'  represented  the  sun.  With  the  sun  it 
moved,  sinking  deep  at  midniglit,  just  sliowing  on  the 

1    riiny,  N.H. 

-  Theopompus  (330  B.C.)  says  that  in  the  west  they  called  the 
winter  Kvonos.  See  him  quoted  by  Plutarch,  Isis  ct  Osiris,  Ixix.- 
Ixxi. 

"'  Pindar,  P.,  i.  48.  ^  Fowler,  op.  tit.,  p.  209. 

■*  Nymph'ta  nelumbo  ;  see  Perrot  et  Chipiez,  v.  577, 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  389 

surface  at  dawn,  and  rising  high  above  the  water  at 
midday.  It  was,  as  it  were,  the  sun  itself  in  the 
stream,  and  declared  the  wonder  of  his  daily,  as  the 
Nile  of  his  }'earl)-,  withdrawal.  This,  perhaps,  is  the 
'  flower '  carried  in  the  left  hand  of  the  god  ot 
Heliopolis  ;  ^  he  of  Tarsus  certain!}'  holds  a  sceptre 
with   a    lotos    for    finial,-   and    when    we    find     that 


GIGLIO  FROM  LINTEL  OF  RIGATTIEKI   IN  MUSEO  DI  S.  MARCO 

Florence  crowns  her  Marzocco  at  the  solstice  with 
lilies,  and  paints  that  in  the  centre  red,  while  they 
cr}'  from  her  car  giglio  !  giglio  !  ^  a  new  interpreta- 
tion of  the  ancient  flower  begins  to  seem  possible. 
If  the  lotus  became  the  rose  in  the  worship  of 
Helios  at  Rhodes,^  there  is  no  reason  wh}'  we 
should    not   find    it    in   the  giagginolo   of   Florence.^ 

'  Macrob.  Saf.,  i.  17. 

-  Head,  I/ist.  Num.,  p.  614  quoted  by  Frazer,  Adonis,  p.  93,  note. 
^  Cambiagi,  op.  cii.,  pp.  42,  112.  ■•  Head,  op.  cit.,  pp.  53S  seq. 

^  Note  the  curious  fact  that  the  £ii/ggw/o,  ahnost  the  synonym  of  the 
giagghiolo,  is  the  lotos  liee. 


390  Florence  Past  and  Present 

So  Marzocco  and  Giglio  together  would  tell  the 
same  tale. 

Whether  they  kindled  torches  or  no,  all  hot  springs 
were  clearly  born  of  the  setting,  the  secret,  sun,  and 
as  such  were  sacred  to  Hercules  ;  ^  not  so  much,  one 
may  believe,  because  the)'  refreshed  men  after  labour, 
as  because  Hercules  represented  the  eastern  sun-god. 
Malispini  tells  us  that  in  old  times  there  was  such  a 
spring,  a  mile  and  a  half  be)'ond  Fiesole  in  the  hills, 
which  flowed  to  fill  a  bath  in  that  city  ;  brought  there 
in  an  artificial  channel.  The  water  poured  into  the 
bath,  he  adds,  through  the  mouth  of  a  lion  so 
wondrously  wrought  that  it  seemed  alive.-  There  is 
no  reason  to  doubt  the  story,  for  an  early  example  of 
the  same  use  of  the  lion  of  the  eastern  Hercules 
comes  from  Cyprus.'^  At  Fiesole  it  has  double 
value,  however,  as  it  throws  new  light  on  the  Floren- 
tine Marzocco,  showing  him  definitely  as  the  lion 
of-  the  sun.  His  name,  we  ma\'  add,  affords  a 
further  probabilitj^  :  that  the  Mars  of  Camarte  was 
only  Hercules,  that  is  the  sun-god,  under  "another 
title. 

Felt  beyond  question  in  hot  springs,  the  i)ower  of 
the  secret  sun  might,  men  thought,  be  hardl)-  less 
surely  found  in  all  waters  from  the  solstice  onwards  ; 
their   pleasant    warmth   at   midsummer   was   but   the 

^   Allien.,  Dcip.,  xii.  i. 

-   R.  c  G.  Malispini,  Croiiara,  xxv. 

■*  It  was  found  at  Amalluis.     See  Fiazer,  Adonis,  p.  91. 


The  Grille  and  Midsummer  391 

sensible  sign  of  those  deeper  virtues  that  the  decHning 
sun  then  began  to  communicate  to  every  stream. 
There  was  never,  so  far  as  we  know,  any  hot  spring 
at  Florence,  but  the  Arno  flowed  under  the  city 
walls,  and,  by  ancient  tradition,  which  lives  in  a 
measure  to-day,  bathing  in  the  river  began  on  the 
24th  of  June.  This  is  a  practice  so  widespread  in 
Europe  as  to  be  almost  as  universal  as  it  is  natural  ;  ^ 
that  it  is  not  natural  onl}-,  we  may  take  two  signifi- 
cant cases  in  proof. 

In  Roumania  they  have  a  legend  of  the  solstice  ; 
that  the  sun  stood  still  in  the  heavens  to  admire  the 
beauty  of  a  maiden  whom  he  saw  bathing  in  the  sea, 
and  that  his  descending  power  transformed  her  into  a 
rose."-  Here  we  find  again  that  rudd}-  lotos  of  Egypt 
which  alread}',  in  its  northward  progress,  had  become 
a  rose  at  Rhodes,  in  view  of  a  Colossus  who  was  the 
sun  god  of  the  East  on  his  way  to  become  the  Greek 
Hercules.  So,  too,  the  people  of  the  Italian  Abruzzi 
explain  the  custom  of  bathing  on  the  24th  of  June, 
which  they  also  share,  by  saying  that  the  water  then 
acquires  marvellous  virtue  by  the  descent  into  it  of 
the  sun  and  moon  together.^  Here  the  male  and  the 
female,  the  goddess  and  the  god,  are  seen  combining 
in  this  secret  work,  which  at  Florence — the  daughter 
of  Arnina  and  Camarte — must  once  have  been  thought 


'  For  many  examples  see  Frazer,  Adonis,  pp.  204  seq. 
~  R.  Folkard,  Platit  Zc^n- (London,  18S4),  p.  516. 
•*  G.  Finamore,  Credenzc  ,   .  .  Abriizzcsi,  pp.  156-60. 


392  Florence  Past  and  Present 

due  to  the  united  force  of  Arna  and  of  Mars  directed 
at  midsummer  to  this  end.  The  Giglio  and  the 
Marzocco  would  thus  appear  as  the  patent  symbols, 
not  so  much  of  the  Ville  taken  separately,  as  of  this 
myth,  and  of  the  faith  in  it  which  made  of  these  two 
towns  one  Florence.  Nor  is  it  without  significance 
here  that  in  historic  times,  as  Florence  added  to  her 
growing  province  on  every  side,  each  fresh  submission 
to  her  arms  was  marked  by  a  new  '  cero '  offered  at 
this  date  and  feast.  As  to  the  bathing  then  practised, 
its  real  character  was  so  well  known  that  the  Church 
early  forbade  it  because  involving  a  deep  pagan 
superstition.^  What  that  belief  was  we  have  already 
seen. 

The  final  ceremony  of  the  feast  was  the  horse-race 
for  a  prize  ;  the  famous  Palio  of  Florence.  This  took 
place  in  the  evening  of  the  great  day,  and  the  horses 
ran,  sometimes  with  riders  on  their  backs,  sometimes 
without,  but  always  across  the  city  from  west  to  east. 
At  one  time  the  race  went  by  Via  Palazzuolo  and 
Via  della  Spada,  at  another  by  Borgognissanti  and 
Via  Vigna  Nuova  to  the  same  point  at  the  corner  of 
Palazzo  Strozzi  ;  but  always  from  thence,  by  Via 
Strozzi,  Via  degli  Spe/.iaH,  and  the  Corso,  to  San 
Piero  and  the  Port'  alia  Croce,  where  the  goal  was  set 
and  the  Palio  waited  the  winner.  This  prize  was 
poorer  or  richer  according  to  the  circumstances  of  the 

^  See    Giimm,    neiiische   M.,   i.   p.    4Q0,  and    S.  Aiignsti)ii    Opera 
(Paris,   1683),  V.  903,  and  p.  ii.  461  ei  seq. 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  393 

city,  but  ever  of  scarlet,  whether  simple  cloth,  rich 
velvet,  or  gold  brocade.^ 

It  is  not  difficult  to  find  in  such  a  race  the  final 
expression  of  just  those  fundamental  ideas  we  have 
traced  in  the  feast  itself  From  Via  Tornabuoni 
eastward,  the  course  laid  for  it  never  varied,  and  as 
one  realises  once  more  that  the  Mugnone  used  to 
flow  here,  and  that  the  '  gorgo '  lay  between  St. 
Ambrogio  and  the  Port'  alia  Croce,^  it  seems  likely 
that  the  race  was  originally  from  water  to  water. 
Poseidon,  the  water  god,  was  also  the  god  of  the 
horse  and  the  patron  of  horse  races,  and  it  is  difficult 
to  believe  that  this  race  could  be  run  on  the  24th  of 
June  without  reference  to  the  waters,  and  to  the 
powers  that  then  in  a  special  manner  made  these 
streams  their  home. 

It  was  the  sun,  the  heavenly  fire,  that  entered  the 
water  to  work  wonders,  and  this  other  element  finds 
no  less  clear  expression  in  the  race  than  do  the 
streams  which  were  then  supposed  to  receive  him. 
The  horse  belongs,  we  may  remember,  to  Helios  no 
less  than  to  Poseidon.  Here,  at  P'lorence,  the  invari- 
able course  from  stream  to  stream  is  the  original 
Decumamis  of  the  city,  once  traced  in  a  rite  in- 
distinguishable from  Sun-worship,  and  now  retraced 
by  these  thundering  hoofs  against  the  path  of  the 
sun,  for  this  is  the  day  of  his  retreat,  the  opening  of 
his  hidden  work.     So  the  Pelopium  of  Elis — her  field 

^  Cambi.igi,  op.  cit.,  pp.  58-60,  14S-62.  "  See  above,  p.  108. 


394  Florence  Past  and  Present 

dedicated  to  the  sun — was  built  about,  and  had  its 
door  so  set  that  none  could  enter  it  save  as  they 
moved  from  west  to  east.^  And  the  Palio  itself,  the 
prize  that  Florence  held  out,  declared  in  its  very 
colour  that  fire  which,  falling  from  heaven  and  ready 
to  become  secret,  was  the  hope  of  the  day  ;  the  goal 
towards  which  not  the  race  alone  but  the  whole 
festival  steadily  moved  ;  in  the  sunset  that  wakened 
the  cricket's  song. 

In  a  final  word  let  it  now  be  said,  by  way  of 
summing  up,  that  while  many  of  the  details  of  this 
Midsummer  feast,  in  Greece  and  Florence  alike,  must 
be  pronounced  mere  accretions,  and  fit,  as  such,  to  be 
the  despair  of  one  who  would  reduce  them  to  the 
exact  order  of  a  historic  development,  the  root  of  the 
whole  is  equally  plain  and  ancient.  It  cannot  be 
without  meaning  that  in  so  many  parts  of  Europe 
water  is  made  to  play  a  distinct  part  in  harvest 
festivals,  or  that,  alike  in  Germany,  on  the  Danube, 
and  in  rural  France,  the  fire  of  St.  John  in  several 
forms  is  thrown  into  wells  and  streams  at  Midsummer, 
sometimes  with  the  expressed  purpose  of  communi- 
cating virtue  to  their  waters.'-'  The  oldest  objects  of 
pagan  worship,  the  stock  and  the  stone,  had  that 
place  and  ke])t  it  long  because  the)-  were  supposed 
to  be  the  dwelling-places  of  the  sun's  fire.  Not  the 
discovery   of  fire   by  man,  remember,    but    only    the 

1   Pausanias,  v.  13. 

-  Frazer,  Golden  Bough,  iii.  pp.  273,  278,  2S1. 


TREE    FROM    WIHCH    CRICKETS    ARE    SOLD    ON    ASCENSION    DAY 


The  Grillo  and  Midsummer  397 

sudden  fancy  that  saw  the  sun  itself  in  the  spark, 
gave  the  stock  and  stone  their  high  place.  But  for 
fancy  the  waters  give  direct  vision  ;  of  the  sun,  that 
seems  by  reflection  to  inhabit  their  depths.  Thus  the 
dyad  becomes  a  triad  ;  water,  wood  and  stone  ranking 
together — that  as  the  vehicle,  these  as  the  more 
permanent  dwelling-places  of  the  fire  of  heaven. 
When  the  matter  is  thus  seen  at  its  simplest  it 
becomes  impossible  to  assign  any  order  or  date  to 
the  stages  of  such  a  belief,  or  to  set  any  limit  to  its 
possible  antiquity. 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE    FEAST   OE   SEPTEMBER 

The  evening  of  the  /th  uf  September  is  dis- 
tinguished by  a  curious  observance,  less  known 
than  those  of  the  other  Florentine  festivals  because 
few  who  notice  such  things  are  then  in  town.  Once 
indeed,  and  not  so  long  ago,  this  drew  crowds  from 
the  surrounding  country  ;  now  what  is  left  passes 
unobserved  in  the  poorer  suburbs  and  outskirts  of 
the  city,  and  is  in  fact  rather  the  sport  of  children 
than  the  more  serious  matter  that  past  generations 
knew.  Such  as  it  is,  the  Ficnicolonc  may  well  demand 
attention,  if  only  because  of  the  greater  past  it  still 
faintly  represents. 

Light  is  the  chief  feature  of  this  children's  game. 
Tapers  and  candles  are  set  in  lanterns  of  coloured 
paper  where  their  blaze  makes  a  bra\e  show.  The 
paper  is  stretched  on  slips  of  cane  or  thin  wood,  so 
bent  that  the  lantern  takes  the  shape  desired,  as  a 
boat,  a  globe,  a  fish  or  a  bell  :  to  name  those  most 
commonly  seen.  So  shaped,  it  dangles  with  its 
dancing    flame  swung  from  the  end  of  a  long  cane 

398 


The  Feast  of  September  399 

which  the  child  carries  in  his  hand.  There  is  a 
natural  rivalry  in  the  matter  ;  each  child  proud  to 
think  his  own  lantern  the  best  ;  and,  as  the\'  move, 


PAPER    LANTERNS    FROM    FIERUCOLONE    OF    I9IO 

meet  and  challeny;e  each  other  on  the  street,  the 
traditional  rhyme  is  still  heard  : — 

L'e  piu  bella  la  mia  Mine  is  the  better,  braveand  fine ! 

Che  quella  della  zia  My  aunt  "s  is  nothing,  look  at  mine! 

though  the  days  are  past  when  this  lantern-pla}-  was 
the  diversion,  not  of  children  only,  but  of  their  elders 
as  well.  Another  rhyme  belonging  to  the  same 
occasion  : — 

Bello,  bello  !  Here  is  a  basket !  look  to  me, 

A  chi  lo  guarda,  l'e  un  For  a  better  liasket  you  ne'er  shall 

corbello.  see. 


400  Florence  Past  and  Present 

would  seem  to  indicate  that  the  lantern  of  to-day 
was  once  an  ordinary  basket,  carrying  a  candle  and 
swinging  from  the  end  of  a  pole. 

The  noise  that  accompanies  these  dancing  lights 
is  something  beyond  the  shouts  of  childish  delight  or 
even  rivalry  ;  it  lias  a  further  meaning  that  may  often 
be  bitter  enough  ;  filled  as  it  is  with  the  spirit  of 
Florentine  mocker}',  than  which  none  is  sharper. 
Each  quarter  of  the  town,  each  street  almost,  has  its 
butt  ;  some  unfortunate  man  or  woman  who,  for  one 
reason  or  another,  often  merely  a  physical  peculiarity 
or  deformit}',  has  drawn  the  attention  and  the  malice 
of  the  neighbourhood.  At  the  Ficrucolone  this 
enmity  finds  full  expression.  An  effigy  of  the  person 
in  question  is  prepared,  and,  set  on  a  pole,  is  carried 
through  the  streets.^  How  the  lanterns  crowd  about 
it  ;  how  the  clamour  rises  afresh  ;  the  whistles  that 
are  blown,  the  bells  that  are  rung  ;  the  mocking  jests 
that  fly  freely  as  the  figure  makes  its  progress  :  one 
can  fancy  it  all,  and  yet  feel  sure  that  the  fancy  falls 
short  of  the  fact  in  Florence,  where  no  feast  would 
seem  complete  without  such  salt.  This  at  anyrate 
is,  I  am  told,  the  chief  remaining  feature  of  the 
popular  festival  to-day. 

Once,  '  the  feast  of  lanterns,'  as  we  may  call  it,  was 
much  more  important.  The  name  Fierucolone — an 
augmented  diminutive  of  fiera — tells  us  that  a  fair 

'   An  example  of  this  elTigy,  ami  a  colleclion  of  Fierucolone  lanterns 
may  be  seen  in  the  Museo  Etnografico,  Florence. 


The  Feast  of  September  401 

took  place  on  the  8th  of  September,  and  relates  it  to 
some  other  and  greater  occasion  of  the  same  kind  ; 
no  doubt  the  midsummer  display  of  stuffs  and 
brocades  in  For'  Santa  Maria  on  the  24th  of  June. 
If  Florence  had  thought  only  of  these — her  glory — 
this  would  have  been  simph'  the  Fiemcola,  the  '  poor 
fair  of  poor  things '  ;  for  what  other  comparison 
could  there  be  between  the  finest  Florentine  products 
and  the  coarse  countr}'-made  linen,  and  the  strings 
of  dried  mushrooms  that  were  bought  and  sold  in 
September.  Yet  the  country  so  crowded  the  town  to 
sell  and  see,  and  the  town  so  poured  itself  into  the 
street  to  see  and  bu)',  that  the  Fierucola  was  indeed 
the  Fierucolonc,  the  great  occasion  of  the  }'ear  in 
this  humbler  commerce. 

The  hills  sent  tiieir  stout  spinners  and  weavers  of 
yarn  ;  women  of  the  mountains,  large  of  figure,  light 
of  foot  and  tongue,  apt  at  a  bargain  ;  who  came  to 
Florence  a  thousand  together,  attended  by  the  hill- 
men,  their  fathers,  husbands,  and  sons,  all  keen  on 
business,  but  no  less  read)'  for  the  holiday  and  the 
feast.  The  7th  of  September  saw  their  arrival,  and 
the  Church  of  the  Annunziata  received  these  pilgrims, 
whose  piety  was  combined  with  the  desire  to  do 
much  business  and  carrx-  good  money  home.  The 
rolls  of  rough  linen  la}'  in  heaps  under  the  Loggie  of 
the  Piazza,  and  there  too,  in  the  Cloister  and  even  the 
Church  itself,  the  pilgrims  of  the  fair  themselves  lay 
down  to  sleep  when   their  devotions  were  over.     So 

2  C 


402  Florence  Past  and  Present 

strange  was  the  sight ;  so  uncouth  the  people  and 
their  clothes  and  prayers  ;  that  the  open  Church,  the 
Cloister  and  the  Piazza,  where  till  midnight  the  wild 
scene  went  on,  and  all  night  long  this  mass  of  country 
people  slept,  drew  the  town  as  to  a  public  spectacle. 
The  boys  of  Florence,  you  may  be  sure,  did  not  lose 
their  opportunity.  They  stole  among  the  groups  of 
praying,  singing,  sleeping  people,  now  mocking  their 
mountain  latin,  now  setting  to  ribald  music  an  imita- 
tion of  the  wild  cadence  in  which  the  country  folk 
prayed,  now  blowing  at  the  sleepers'  very  ears  whistles 
of  clay  that  were  fit  to  wake  the  dead.  Whistling, 
ringing  and  mockery  may  be  still  heard  at  the 
Fierucolone,  but  these  are  only  the  poor  survival  of 
a  yet  coarser  and  wilder  past.  No  effigy  was  then 
needed,  for  the  country  people,  present  in  person, 
were  themselves  the  butt  of  the  town,  though  it  is 
said  that  as  long  as  the  fair  lasted  many  a  paper 
lantern  was  itself  a  '  guy,'  dressed  to  the  figure  of 
the  country  fashion.  But  neither  mockery  nor  per- 
secution could  turn  back  the  people  of  the  hills,  or 
defeat  the  combined  claims  of  religion  and  of  business 
they  felt  so  deeply. 

It  would  seem  then  as  if  this  persistence  marked 
the  Fierucolone  as  a  very  ancient  observance ;  it 
invites  us  at  any  rate  to  ask  what  the  root  of  the 
matter  can  possibly  have  been.  The  Ecclesiastical 
Calendar  might  provide  an  answer,  showing  us  the 
7th    of   September    as   the    Vigil,    and    the    8th   as 


The  Feast  of  September  403 

the  clay,  of  the  Virgin's  birth.  Yet  this  solution  is 
hardly  sufficient  to  remove  all  doubt.  The  ecclesi- 
astical date  is  said  to  have  been  fixed  about  695  A.D., 
by  the  dream  of  a  monk,  but  its  observance  was  not 
general  in  the  W'est  till  the  end  of  the  first  Christian 
millennium,  or  even  later.^  In  the  absence  of  any 
direct  tradition  as  to  the  commencement  of  the 
Fierucolone  at  Florence,  to  suppose  the  observance 
no  older  than  the  date  and  use  just  mentioned  is  little 
more  satisfactory  than  to  say  that  it  began  in  the 
public  rejoicings  ordered  in  1683,  when  Vienna  was 
deliv'Cred  this  day  from  the  fear  of  the  Turk.  So  too 
the  ecclesiastical  date  ma}^  have  added  prestige  to 
the  Fierucolone,  and  secured  its  observance  clown  to 
our  own  times,  but  can  hardly  be  supposed  enough  to 
account  for  so  deeply  rooted  a  popular  habit  and  use. 
The  fair,  we  are  told,  was  originally  held,  not  at  the 
Church  of  the  Virgin  as  in  later  days,  but  at  that  of 
San  Piero  Maggiore,-  and  in  the  adjoining  market. 
Thus  the  connection  of  the  Fierucolone  with  the 
Virgin  is  seen  to  be  both  late  and  dubious.  W^e 
know  this  Mercatino  as  in  all  probability  the  original, 
the  pre-roman  market  of  Florence  ;  this  covipitiim  at 
San  Piero  as  one  of  her  oldest  religious  centres.  It 
would  seem  as  if  the  origin   and    real   nature  of  the 

'  I  )iii;ui(lus,  Dh'iii.  Offir.,  vii.  28;  Muratori,  A'./.S.,  ii.  p.  ii. 
1021.  The  latter  document  shows  that  about  looo  A.D.  the  observ- 
ance of  the  Virgin's  birth  was  not  yet  general  in  Italy. 

-  See  G.  Conti,  Fii-euze  Vcahia  (1899),  PP-  606  seq.,  for  this 
important  fact,  and  for  many  details  of  the  feast  in  later  times. 


404 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


Fierucolone  must  be  sought  in  the  remote  past  of 
Florentine  paganism,  rather  than  in  the  nearer 
antiquity  of  her  Christianity,  even  the  first.  We  may 
begin  the  search  b\'  considering  the  probabiHties  of 
the  case  ;  both  general  and  particular. 


riAZZA    Ol'-    S.     riKKO^     \VHH     I'OKTICO    .H      ClIL'Rtil 
The  arch  on  the  left  leads  to  Rorgo  Piiiti 

Pre-Christian  festivals  ccrtainK'  marl^cd  the  chief 
astronomical  moments  in  the  Morcntinc  }'car,  for  at 
the  winter  solstice  we  have  found  the  Cepi:)o,  at  the 
spring  ecjuinox  the  Fire  of  Fortune,  and  at  the 
solstice  of  summer  the  feast  of  Hercules  or  Bacchus, 
the  feast  of  the  departing  sun.  \ow  the  month  of 
September  holds  a  similar  date  in  that  of  the  autumn 


The  Feast  of  September  405 

equinox  ;  it  would  be  strange  then  did  it  not  show  a 
hke  feast. 

We  expect  another  festival,  and  are  not  without  the 
means  of  arriving  at  a  plausible  conjecture  regarding 
its  nature.  During  the  greater  part  of  the  month  the 
sun  moves  in  the  sign  of  Virgo,  the  young  woman 
who  holds  in  her  hand  the  stars  called  arist(X  or  spica 
Virghiis — the  ear  of  corn. ^  Now  this  cannot  be  the 
corn  of  harvest,  for  reaping  was  done  in  June,  and 
finished,  at  latest,  in  July.  It  can  only  be  the  corn 
of  seed-time,  and  in  fact  the  sowing  began  in 
September  as  ancient  authors  tell.-  The  chief  seed- 
time la}'  after  the  equinox,  but  sowing  was  done  in  a 
measure  before  that  date.  The  September  festival 
must  have  to  do  with  the  seed-time,  and  would  rather 
precede  the  equinox  than  follow  it,  for  anticipation  is 
ever  a  note  of  Italian  religious  practice. 

The  poet  Ausonius  gives  the  Autumn  to  Volcanus :  ^ 
September  walks  in  purple,  and  holds  a  cornucopia 
full  of  the  fruits  of  the  earth.  We  are  here  on 
familiar  ground,  for  Volcanus  is  only — and  here 
evidentl}- — a  forni  of  that  Bacchus  who  is  also 
Hercules,  the  subterranean  power  of  the  sun,  now  in 
full  retreat  and  seen  therefore  in  a  new  fruitfulness. 
And  Virgo  ;  who  can  she  be  but   Fortuna,  or    Arna 

^  See  ISIacrobius,  Sat.,  i.  21.  and  Pliny,  X.H.,  xviii.  31,  74.  The 
latter  authority  says  the  stars  of  Spica  rose  nn  the  15th  of  the  month. 

-  See  Libri  de  Re  Rustica  (Florenti:^:  Junta,   1515),   pp.   222  ro. 
223  ro.,  319  vo.'izx  vo. 

^  D.  M.  Ausonius,  Eclog.,  ed.  Scaliger  (15SS),  p.  1S6. 


4o6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

to  use  her  Florentine  name,  the  goddess  of  the  spring 
and  of  the  harvest,  now  ready  to  preside  over 
another  seed-time  ?  Her  arista  is  even  now  the 
word  used  in  Florence  for  a  baked  pig's  chine,  as  if 
she  were  indeed  the  Greek  Demeter  to  whom  that 
animal  was  sacred.^  She  is  the  guide  and  hope  of 
those  who  sow,  yet  not  without  the  help  of  him  who 
comes  to  carry  her  cornucopia  while  she  is  thus  busy. 
His  is  the  subterranean  heat  which  strikes  upwards  in 
the  soil,  and  saves  the  seed  from  death  in  the  furrow. 
Demeter  the  corn  mother,  Dionysus  her  consort, 
Proserpine  her  daughter,  who  was  the  corn  cast  into 
the  earth  and  left  for  six  months  to  that  dark 
keeping  :  such  are  the  personages  of  the  sacred 
drama  we  have  the  right  to  expect. 

Here  and  now,  on  Italian  soil  ;  on  the  7th  and 
8th  of  September  ;  we  have  the  full  right  to  expect 
them.  There  may  have  been  transference  hither 
from  a  later  date;  from  the  15th  of  the  month, 
or  even  from  the  equinox  itself,  under  some  disturb- 
ance or  new  attraction  brought  among  these  days  by 
the  Calendar  of  late  Christian  time.  Or  there  may 
have  been  nothing  of  the  kind  ;  onl)'  tliat  anticipa- 
tion of  the  eciuinox  1)\-  the  8th  of  the  montli  which 
the  relation  of  Ascension  day  to  the  summer  solstice 
so  plainly  suggests.-     The  fact  is  that  even  now  at 

'  So  Vairo  calls  tlie  ridge  belv\een  two  furrows /(^;rrt.     See  De  Re 
Rtist.,  i.  32,  and  Nonius,  De  Com.  Doct.,  pp.  62,  152. 
-  See  above,  p.  357. 


The  Feast  of  September  407 

Naples  the  Virgin's  birthday,  as  celebrated  at 
Piedigrotta,  is  known  in  the  gei-go  as  la  Coriata  ;  ^  the 
feast  of  the  Kore,  the  Proserpine  who  is  the  corn  of 
seed-time.  It  would  not  be  wonderful  then  if  we 
were  to  find  the  old  Greek  drama,  in  which  she 
played  a  principal  part,  fully  staged  in  the  correspond- 
ing Tuscan  feast. 

The  Greater  Mysteries  of  Demeter,  held  at  Eleusis 
in  mid-September,  certainly  show  several  points  of 
agreement  with  the  Fierucolone  of  Florence.  The 
date  sufficiently  corresponds,  for  the  Mysteries  were 
celebrated  from  the  15th  of  Bocdromiou  onwards,- 
and  Boedroinion  is,  for  practical  purposes,  our  month 
of  September.  At  Eleusis,  as  at  Florence,  the  crowd 
from  all  parts  of  the  country  was  very  great.  An 
early  day  was  devoted  to  a  ceremonial  purification 
of  the  candidates,  who  found  the  lustral  water  in  the 
neighbouring  river.  Of  this  no  distinct  trace  remains 
at  Florence,  but  the  original  site  of  the  Fierucolone 
at  the  Mercatino,  close  to  the  waters  of  the  Affrico 
and  the  gorgo,  would  be  very  proper  for  such  a 
purpose.  Next  came  the  procession  of  the  cistifcrs  : 
may  one  see  something  of  this  in  the  lights  hidden  in 
corhcUi  at  the  Fierucolone,  and  in  the  lanterns  that, 
for  all  their  brightness,  were  but  swinging  baskets 
too    of  coloured    paper  ?     Something  of  a   wish    to 

1  E.  Mirabella,  op.  cit.,  p.  228. 

-  Plut.,  Demetr.,  26.  This  is  the  date  adopted  by  Meursius  in  his 
Elensinia,  c.  21,  which  may  be  consulted  for  details. 


4o8  Florence  Past  and: Present 

hide  as  well  as  to  show  is  clearly  present  ;  the  light 
is  there,  sure  enough,  but  either  you  do  not  name  it 
at  all,  or  in  your  rh\'me  you  must  call  it  not  a  light, 
or  even  a  lantern,  but  a  basket.  '  A  chi  lo  guarda, 
I'e  un  corbello.' 

Lights  there  were  at  Eleusis  as  at  Florence,  moving 
in  the  long  procession  led  by  the  Dadoiidios.  Under 
his  guidance,  and  carrying  their  torches,  the  candi- 
dates for  initiation  passed  along  the  sacred  street  to 
the  temple  of  the  goddess,  where  they  spent  the 
night.  The  Greek  scene,  one  sees,  cannot  have 
differed  much  from  that  acted  at  the  Fierucolone 
to  the  wonder  of  Florence.  Next  day  saw  another 
procession  with  the  figure  of  the  god  in  the  midst, 
borne  on  high  above  the  shouting  crowd.  The 
close  of  the  whole  celebration  brought  the  cr/vfoya/xara, 
the  biting  ribald  jests  levelled  from  the  bridge  by 
the  initiated  against  the  passing  crowd.  It  ma}'  well 
be  that  \\\Q.frizzo^  that  peculiar  product  of  Florentine 
wit,  like  so  much  else  here,  derives  its  spirit  and  its 
form  from  a  remote  past,  and  from  a  Greek  original. 

The  comparison  between  the  Fierucolone  and  the 
Eleusinia  need  not  be  confined  to  such  details,  and 
should  not  linger  upon  them.  The  Greek  Mysteries 
had  a  centre,  a  rite  of  chief  importance,  about  which 
all  the  subordinate  ceremonies  gathered,  and  from 
which  they  took  their  meaning  :  a  thing  done  in 
secret,  and  revealed  onh-  to  the  epoptai.  If  we  can 
find   this,   or  anything  like   it,   at    Florence  we  may 


The  Feast  of  September  409 

feel  certain  of  the  practical  identit}-  of  Greek  and 
Tuscan  doctrine.  It  will  be  best,  however,  to 
approach  so  cardinal  a  point  gradually,  and  from  the 
Tuscan  and  even  the  local  side. 

Locally,  the  original  seat  of  the  Fierucolone  lay 
at  San  Pietro,  that  is  at  the  covipituiii  where  we  have 
already  suspected  the  presence  of  Janus  :  hitherto  a 
mere  name  indeed,  but  one  that  is  more  than 
suggested  by  the  neighbouring  gcniciilinii.  It  is 
time  these  names  were  examined  more  closely. 

At  Rome,  Janus  was  held  as  one  of  the  Dii 
Penates/  and  as  a  good  authority  tells  us  that  in 
Etruria  the  same  place  was  given  to  the  Genius 
Jovialis — the  spirit  of  Jupiter  - — it  is  natural  to  con- 
clude that  this  is  Etruscan  doctrine  throughout,  and 
that  the  Ani  oi  Tuscany  became  at  Rome  indifferently 
Janus  or  Genius.  He  was  the  inward  power  of 
generation,  the  masculine  power,  like  the  Greek 
Hercules  ;  the  spirit,  then,  not  of  Jove  only,  but  of  all 
male  deities  ;  the  god  of  all  men.  In  this  masculine 
world  he  was  just  what  his  corresponding  Uui  became 
in  the  world  of  the  women.  The  pair  represented  in 
fact  the  idea  of  personalit}-,  divine  or  human,  doubled 
by  that  of  sex,  and  ready  to  reproduce  its  like.  Men 
swore  b)-  Hercules,  women  by  Juno.  A  man 
'  indulged  his  Genius,'  an  angry  woman  said  of 
herself    '  my    Juno    is    passionate.'       By    an     easy 

'   Procop.,  Dc  bell.  Goth.,  i.  25. 

"  Quoted  by  Arnobius,  Adv.  Geutcs,  iii.  40. 


41  o  Florence  Past  and  Present 

transition,  not  unknown  to-day,  this  Juno  became 
the  Fortune,  perhaps  the  Fate,  of  her  possessor. 
There  are  inscriptions  which  give  the  Genius  as 
the  male  form  of  the  Fortuna,  in  a  distribution  of 
office  wliich  recalls  exactly  the  relation  between  the 
male  agathodcemon  and  the  female  agathc  tycJie  of  the 
Greeks.^  The  serpent,  whom  we  have  met  so  often 
already,  was  the  recognised  s\-mbol  of  both. 

The  sure  sign  that  we  ha\"e  not  wandered  from 
ancient  Tuscan  ideas  is  seen  in  the  noted  and 
peculiar  relation  between  Hercules  and  Juno  dis- 
played in  many  examples  of  Etruscan  art :  on  the 
mirror,  for  instance,  where  Hercules  is  seen  as  the 
mate  of  Juno;-  evidently  he  can  hardly  be  other 
than  the  Genius  Jovialis,  the  spirit  of  Jupiter,  on 
which  graphic  art  can  la}'  no  emphasis  save  by 
presenting  him  as  a  distinct  figure.  This  Hercules, 
or  Genius,  and  this  Juno  his  companion,  belong 
originally  to  Ionia,  where  they  are  seen  together  on 
the  coins  of  Thasos  and  the  frieze  of  Assos.^ 

The  Janus  belonged  not  to  individuals  only,  but 
to  human  groups  as  well,  who  worshipped  him  as  the 
common  spirit  of  their  clan  ;  embodying,  as  it  were, 
its  personality,  and  giving  distinction  to  its  members. 
This  cult  was  naturally  most  deeply  felt  among  the 
upper  classes  where  it  amounted  to  a  worship  of  the 

'  Daremberg  et  Saglio,  5.c'.  'Genius.' 

-  Fowler,  op.  cit.,  p.  143. 

^  Daremberg  et  Saglio,  s.v.  '  Heraklc.«.' 


The  Feast  of  September  411 

spirit  of  the  family.  The  '  Janus  Patricius  '  is,  in  fact, 
known  to  have  borne  that  title  in  old  Rome,i  a.nd  as 
such  he  can  have  been  no  other  than  the  Genius  of 
the  Gens.  Thus  when  at  Florence  we  find,  in  the 
immediate  neighbourhood  of  San  Pietro,  both  the 
Via  Gcntilis  and  the  Geniculnm'^  the  full  sense  of 
such  names  begins  at  last  to  appear.  x-\t  this 
compitiun  the  spirit  of  religion  and  of  family  stood  at 
its  height  ;  in  a  double  culmination  indeed,  for  this 
paganism  was  nothing  if  not  aristocratic  ;  its  last 
refuge  lay  in  those  patrician  families  who  so  long 
resisted  Christianity,  as  preferring  to  '  indulge  their 
genius '  and  still  to  sacrifice  at  his  altars.  In 
Florence  the  greater  of  these  shrines  probably  stood 
at  the  eastern  cross-roads,  and  the  lesser  was  that 
geniculnm  we  have  found  close  b\',  on  the  Via  Sacra. 
This  Janus,  who  was  pre-eminentl}-  pater ;  this 
Genius  thought  of  as  the  author  of  life  in  all  its 
forms  ;  himself  provides  an  easy  transition  from  the 
local  centre  of  his  cult  at  Florence  to  the  subject 
more  immediately  in  hand  ;  the  purpose  that  drew  the 
people  there  in  thousands,  every  September,  as  the 
autumn  equinox  approached.  For  it  was  the  seed- 
time the  countrx-  had  in  mind  ;  the  risk  implied  in 
that  great  committal  of  grain  to  earth  ;  the  powers 
to  be  propitiated  on  such  an  occasion.     And  one  of 

^  Roscher,  Lex.,  21,  26,  40.  Preller  compares  the  similar  cult- 
title  Trarpt^os  found  at  Athens  and  used  to  distinguish  the  god  wor- 
shipped by  those  ot  Ionian  descent. 

-  See  above,  pp.  116,  117. 


412  Florence  Past  and  Present 

the  cult-titles  of  Janus,  Consivus,  the  god  of  sowing,^ 
shows  that  he  was  indeed  recognised  in  a  character 
peculiarly  appropriate  to  this  season  and  to  the  work 
then  in  hand.  So,  too,  the  Genius  appears  as  the  close 
associate,  if  not  actually  the  equivalent  oi  Liber  ;  -  that 
Bacchus  who  bore  the  cornucopia  and  represented 
the  vis  iiitiiiia,  the  hidden  power,  of  earthh'  plenty, 
which  men  thcuight  could  be  no  other  than  the 
subterranean  sun.  Committed  to  this  power,  all 
seeds  must  needs  be  safe,  warmed  and  made  fertile  by 
that  secret  and  genial  heat. 

We  have  almost  forgotten  that  Janus  does  not 
work  alone,  that  he  x?.  Juuoniiis  \'''  known  therefore 
not  so  much  in  himself  as  by  the  name  of  his 
female  companion.  How  much  was  thought  to 
depend  on  this  union  and  co-operation  of  the 
goddess  with  the  god,  the  Mysteries  of  Demeter 
are  ready  to  show.  We  return  to  them,  for  a 
moment,  that  they  may  throw  fresh  light  on  the 
market,  the  fair,  and  the  feast  of  Florence,  and  of 
September. 

At  Eleusis  the  heart  of  the  Mysteries  lay  here,  in 

a  co-operation  of  the  goddess  and  the  god  that  was 

figuratively   set    forth    as    a    marriage,   visible  to   the 

initiated  alone,  and  in   the  {ox\w  of  ritual  espousals 

where    the  hierophant  stood   for   Dionwsus,  and    the 

^  Macrob.,  Sat.,  i.  9. 

-  '  Si  quel  ad  hoc  templum  rem  divinam  fecerit  Jovi  Libeio  aut  Jovis 
Genio.'     Inscription  from  Furfo  (Naples)  C.I.L.,  i.  603. 
^  Macrob.,  Sat.,  i.  9, 


The  Feast  of  September  413 

chief  priestess  for  Demeter.^  Hope  lay  in  their  thus 
joining  hands  to  help,  and  the  first  direction  of  the 
expected  power  was  declared  in  another  symbol 
shown  to  anxious  eyes :  the  ear  of  corn,  whose 
grains  were  ready  to  fall  into  the  ground.  Demeter 
was  thus  named  in  the  silence  of  the  mystery  as  the 
corn-mother,-  and  her  marriage  appeared  as  the  only 
rite  that  could  secure  the  presence  and  power  of  the 
corn-father,  without  which  all  must  come  to  nothing. 
These  ritual  espousals  must  once  have  been  a  sun- 
charm,  meant  to  command  the  subterranean  heat  and 
set  it  about  its  gcjiial  hopeful  work. 

A  rite  not  ver)-  dissimilar  has  left  traces  of  its 
presence  in  Florentine  history,  and  has  deepl\- 
impressed  the  popular  imagination.  We  have  already 
noticed,  in  passing,  the  curious  ceremon}'  of  the 
Archbishop's  marriage  to  the  Abbess  of  San  Pietro,^ 
and  may  now  refer  to  the  matter  again,  and  in  more 
detail,  as  it  has  an  evident  interest  at  this  point  of 
our  argument.  In  1567,  not  twenty  \-ears  before  the 
old  custom  was  abolished,  this  was  the  way  of  it  ;  as 
we  learn  from  a  note  in  manuscript  made  at  the  time.^ 
The  day  happened  on  that  occasion  to  be  the 
14th    of   May,     and     Monsignore    opened    his    pro- 

^   See  authorities  cited  iu  I>a\\son,  (>/.  lit.,  pp.  579-8o. 

-  Hippolytus,  Kefutatio,  v.  viii.  p.  162  (ed.  Duncker  and 
Schneidewin).  See  Frazer,  Adonis,  p.  324,  to  which  I  am  indebted 
for  this  reference. 

'  See  above,  p.  124. 

■*  '  MS.  in  Casa  Tolomei,'  quoted  by  Lastri,  Oss.  I'ior.,  v.  pp. 
S5  seq. 


414  Florence  Past  and  Present 

gress  by  a  short  stage  from  Scandicci  to  Monte 
Oliveto,  where  the  monks  gave  him  hospitahty  till  the 
next  morning.  On  the  15th,  arrayed  in  all  his 
vestments  and  mounted  on  a  white  palfrey,  he  rode 
with  a  great  following  to  Porta  San  Frediano,  where 
the  Grand  Duke's  men  met  him  as  a  guard  of  honour. 
Surrounded  by  the  Visdomini,  the  hereditary  patrons 
of  the  See,  he  thence  moved,  in  the  centre  of  a  great 
procession  of  clerg\'  and  laity,  by  the  Borghi  and 
across  the  Ponte  Vecchio  to  the  Piazza  della  Signoria, 
where  an  address  of  public  welcome  was  presented  and 
answered.  Thence  he  rode  on  to  the  Mercatino,  and 
found  the  Piazza  dressed  in  gala,  and  all  the  Strozzi 
of  the  blood  of  Bianca  ready  to  receive  him.  Here  he 
dismounted,  and  the  Strozzi  allowed  the  servants  of 
the  Convent  to  lead  away  the  palfrey  as  their 
perquisite,  but  kept  the  saddle  and  bridle  for  them- 
selves. With  the  Della  Tosa,  the  Archbishop  now 
entered  the  Churcii  of  San  Piero,  prayed  a  while,  and 
then  took  the  formal  seat  prepared  for  his  new  dignity 
beside  the  altar  and  beneath  the  can()|)y  of  state. 
On  the  other  side  3at  the  Abbess  with  her  nuns,  and 
as  soon  as  all  was  ready  she  rose,  moved  across,  and 
sat  down  on  a  seat  prepared  for  licr  by  the  Arch- 
bishop's side.  He  then  pronounced  a  brief  allocution 
'  in  the  accustomed  form,'  declaring  that  he  accepted 
her  as  his  bride  ;  she  representing  the  Church  of 
p'lorence.  The  rite  was  made  valid  by  the  gift  of  the 
usual  ring,  which  in  this  case  cost  two  hinidred  florins, 


The  Feast  of  September  415 

and  when  the  Archbishop  had  set  it  on  her  finger  she 
returned  to  her  former  place  among  the  sisterhood. 
He  then  blessed  the  people,  left  the  church,  and  went 
to  the  Cathedral,  staying  only  a  moment  at  the 
Geniatiiiiu  in  the  Borgo  to  kneel  and  say  the 
accustomed  prayer.  In  the  afternoon,  when  the 
religious  ceremonies  in  the  Duomo  and  the  Baptistery 
were  over,  and  they  had  eaten,  the  Abbess  of  San 
Piero  sent  her  bridegroom  of  the  morning,  with  great 
pomp,  the  bridal  bed  in  crimson,  gold,  and  fine  linen, 
which  she  and  her  nuns  had  prepared  against  the  time 
when  it  would  be  required.  Thus  the  whole  ceremon)- 
ended  in  a  flourish  of  trumpets.  Lastri  says  of  it : — 
'  This  was  rather  a  mysterious  than  a  mundane 
thing,' ^  and  indeed  it  is  to  be  taken  as  such. 

What  concerns  us  is  to  notice  that  by  all  signs  this 
rite  is  pagan  and  not  Christian,  and  was  probabl}-  a 
ritual  marriage  that  had  come  down  from  immemorial 
antiquity.     In  the  Bishop  of  Florence,  thus  engaged, 

^  Oss.  Fiorentino  (1821),  v.  p.  94.  See  also,  in  A.  Cocchi, 
Chiese  di  Firenze  (1903),  at  p.  103,  the  account  of  an  earlier 
occasion  and  form.  The  words  of  the  BtiUettoite  there  quoted  may  be 
repeated  here  : — iverunt  usque  ad  cameram,  et  in  camera,  domine 
Abbatisse  dicti  monasterii,  in  qua  camera  dictus  dominus  Episcopus 
pulcerrinmm  lectum,  <|uem  dicta  domina  Abbatissa  pro  eo  fieri  fecerat, 
invenit,  et  super  eodem  lecto  requievit  ad  vokmtatem  suam 
Die  autem  sequenti  .  .  .  redierunt  in  mane  ad  dictam  cameram, 
ubi  erat  dictus  dominus  Episcopus  .  .  .  from  which  it  would 
appear  that  in  1286  the  custom  was  that  the  Bishop  should  spend  the 
night  in  the  Convent.  At  Pistoia,  where  a  rite  of  the  same  nature 
obtained,  the  bed  was  set  up  in  the  Choir  of  the  Church.  See  Lastri, 
op.  cit.,  p.  95. 


4i6  Florence  Past  and  Present 

we  see  not  obscurely  the  Hierophant  of  Eleusis  ;  in 
his  Bride  the  priestess  of  the  same  mysteries.  Those 
who  surround  them  at  the  auspicious  moment  are  not 
the  people,  whom  the  Abbess  is  said  to  represent,  but 
the  aristocracy,  and  in  particular  two  families  where 
the  ancient  rule  of  the  matriarchate  still  held  good. 
The  Visdomini  confessed  it  openly  in  their  other  name 
of  Delia  Tosa,  and  the  part  taken  by  the  Strozzi  was 
limited  to  those  who  could  prove  their  descent  from 
Bianca.^  So  the  Bishop  himself  was  not  Bishop  of 
Florence  save  by  consent  of  a  woman,  and  in  right  of 
her  he  espoused.  That  the  '  marriage '  was  localised 
at  San  Piero,  where  of  old  the  September  feast  was 
held,  may  make  us  bold — yet  not  too  bold — in  accept- 
ing the  conjecture  suggested  by  such  a  conjunction. 
Florentine  Christianity  had  probably  lifted  from  its 
true  setting  a  pagan  rite  that  was  once  performed 
yearly  at  this  ver)-  place  as  the  central  mystery  of 
September.  Thus  the  correspondence  with  Eleusis 
would  be  complete,  and  the  ga\-  lights  and  jests  of  the 
Fierncolone  would  take  new  colour  and  meaning  as 
the  natural  accompaniment  of  the  ritual  marriage. 

Were  excavation  possible  on  such  a  site,  there  might 
even  yet  be  found  ])eneath  the  Church  of  San  Piero 
the  subterranean  vault  that  once  knew  the  mystery 
that  called  to  the  subterranean  fire.-     To  see  this  rite 

'  Cosimo  della  Rena,  Serie,  p.  31,  makes  the  whole  family  of  the 
Strozzi  take  both  their  blood  and  their  name  from  a  certain  Strozza. 

-  The  Greek  rite  was  performed  underground.  Lawson,  op.  ciL,  p. 
577- 


The  Feast  of  September  417 

performed  in  their  interest  was  what  drew  crowds  to 
Eleusis  ;  the  same  desire  may  once  have  filled  the 
market  and  temple  of  Arnina,  and  sustained  the 
heart  of  Florentine  worshippers  during  the  long  vigil 
to  the  dawn  of  the  great  day. 

The  substructures  of  San   Piero  wait  to  give  up 
their  secret,  but  at  another  site,  no  great  way  from  the 
city,  something  has  been  found   suggesting  strongh' 
that  Florence  may  indeed  have  known  the  doctrine  of 
Eleusis  ;  the  mystery  of  Demeter  and  of  her  husband, 
of  the  ear  of  corn,  and  of  the  autumn  furrow  that 
the  dark  sun  warmed.     Borghini  tells  us  that  during 
the  sixteenth  century  one  of  the  Adriani  turned  up 
in  his  land  near  Antella  a  small,  rather  thick,  copper 
coin  stamped  with  ears  of  corn  and  lilies.^     On  one 
side   appeared  the  figure  of  three  mounds  of  earth, 
with   an   ear   rising   from   each  ;    that  in    the    centre 
upright,  those  at  the  sides  bowed  outwards.    Together, 
he  says,  they  presented  the  general  form  of  the  gigli'o, 
and  between  the  three  ears  the  spaces  of  the  field 
bore  two  small  gigli.     In  these  latter   he  sees   the 
original  of  the  fioretti ;  the  first  form  of  those  thread- 
like appendages  which,  rising  between  the  petals  as 
stamens  might,  still  distinguish  the  Giglio  of  Florence 
from  that  of  France.      If  he  is  right,  we  may  surely 
read    here    what    he    hardly    suspected.     The    three 
mounds  are  three  ridges  of  the  new-ploughed  field  ; 
the  porcae  of  which  Varro  speaks.-     The  three  ears, 
1  Discorsi,  ii.  p.  193.  2  jj)^  j.^  j^^^^f^^  i   ^2. 

2  D 


41 8  Florence  Past  and  Present 

two  of  which  bend  to  drop  their  grains  in  the  ready- 
furrow,  represent  the  goddess  to  whom  the  pig  was 
sacred  ;  Demeter,  the  mother  of  the  corn.  The  flower 
set  in  such  close  union  with  the  grain — call  it  lily  or 
lotos — is  her  consort,  without  whom  sowing  were  in 
vain,  and  who  certainly  bore  just  such  a  symbol  at 
Tarsus.^  This  coin  of  Antella  might  have  been 
struck  to  commemorate  the  ritual  marriage  of 
September  between  priest  and  priestess,  and  if  we 
accept  what  it  seems  to  give  us,  the  Giglio  of 
Florence  is  not  simple  but  double,  two  in  one,  corn 
and  flower ;  to  signify  goddess  and  god  at  work 
together  in  the  autumn  field  ;  while  its  colour,  as  of 
triumphant  fire,  declares  further  the  same  doctrine  of 
the  subterranean  sun. 

It  will  certainly  be  said  we  go  too  fast  and  too  far  ; 
and  indeed  by  itself  this  coin  were  probably  a  late 
and  surely  an  insufficient  foundation  for  such  a 
building  of  conjecture.  Be  it  ever  so  plausible, 
conjecture  cannot  stand  alone,  and  only  proof  can 
support  it.  If  it  is  to  be  found,  such  proof  must  be 
sought  in  a  yet  nearer  and  deeper  examination  of 
the  matter  in  hand. 

In  general,  it  is  surely  plain  enough  that  a  doctrine 
of  the  subterranean  sun,  such  as  we  have  supposed, 
would,  wherever  it  was  held,  deeply  influence  the 
beliefs  of  living  men  regarding  the  state  of  the  dead. 
The  earth  had  received  them,  must  they  not  belong 
'  See  above,  p.  389. 


The  Feast  of  September  419 

to  the  kingdom  of  that  hidden  power?  So  Pindar,  in 
the  well-known  passage  where  he  sets  forth  the  joys  of 
the  Greek  paradise — its  meadows  aflame  with  roses  ; 
its  trees  of  incense  bearing  golden  fruit  ;  its  games, 
its  music,  its  gardens — in  opening  the  picture,  places 
all  these  delights  under  the  glory  of  a  sun  which 
shines  btvicath,  while  the  living  are  wrapped  in  mid- 
night darkness.^  This,  we  may  believe  is  the  Genius, 
thought  able,  in  an  ultimate  blessing,  to  secure  the 
survival  of  personalit}-  even  under  bodily  dissolution  ; 
and,  in  a  yet  bolder  figure,  this  is  the  Hercules  who 
brings  back  Theseus  and  Alcestis  to  upper  earth 
from  the  under  world.  So  Bacchus  too  was  fabled 
to  have  descended  and  returned  from  thence  in  a 
sun-myth  which  joins  the  Greek  Dionysus  very 
closely  to  the  Egyptian  Osiris.  The  Mysteries  of 
Dionysus,  we  know,  taught  the  hope  of  life  beyond 
the  grave,-  and  in  Egypt  the  same  doctrine,  openly 
expressed  in  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  was  symbolised 
in  the  figure  of  the  lotus  flower  buried  with  every 
mummv.  Tiie  question  then  is  limited.  Such  a 
hope  lived  in  Greece,  declared  in  the  rites  of  Demeter 
and  Dion}-sus ;  in  Eg)-pt  too,  symbolised  by  the 
ruddy  flower  that  sank  and  rose  in  the  Nile  as  the 
sun  went  and  came  between  summer  and  winter,  day 
and  night.     Did  Florence  admit  it,  and  embody  her 

'   Pind.,  Fragm.   iBergk.),  129.      Il  is  quoted  by   Pint.  {Coitsol.  ad 
ApolL,  iii. ),  to  comfort  his  friend  on  the  loss  of  a  son. 
-  Plut.,  Consol.  ad.  uxor.,  10. 


420  Florence  Past  and  Present 

hope  in  her  red  Giglio  ?  Was  she  in  so  supreme  a 
sense  the  city  of  the  Flower? 

The  monumental  stelai  of  the  Museum  suppl)-  an 
immediate  answer.  They  formally  place  the  dead 
under  the  care  of  the  sun  god,  whose  lion  adorns  that 
of  San  Tommaso,  while  others  lift  above  the  grave 
a  triumphant  finial,  which  probably  represents  the 
rising  or  setting  sun.^  This  doctrine  of  immortality 
is  thus  made  good  here  at  least  as  early  as  the  sixth 
century  before  our  Era,  for  the  presence  of  such 
symbols  at  the  grave  can  have  no  other  meaning.  It 
cannot  be  traced  further  back,  but  the  belief  in  life 
beyond  death  sureh'  may ;  what  else  guided  the 
hand  that  left  beside  the  ashes  of  the  dead  the 
ancient  yEgaean  brooch  found  in  one  of  the 
prehistoric  graves  that  underla)^  the  centre  of 
Florence  ?  This  brooch  is  the  beginning  of  the 
funeral  hoard,  and  the  hoard,  consisting  of  useful 
articles,  seems  to  imply  more  than  mere  respect 
for  the  dead  ;  the  feeling  that  finds  expression  in 
such  a  way  is  surely  the  sense  that  the  dead  are 
still  alive. 

If  the  faith  in  Immortality  must  be  recognised  in 
early  Florence  as  well  as  in  Greece  and  Egypt,  and 
if  this  city  acknowledged  betimes  the  definite  doctrine 
of  the  future   life  current   in   the   East,  it   becomes 

1  The  motif  presented  in  these  finials  is  common  in  the  art  of  early 
Crete  and  of  Mycena:.  It  is  found,  reversed,  between  the  legs  of  the 
Amandola  ctatcr  now  in  the  Ancona  Museum,  and  there  appears  to 
represent  definitely  tlie  midnight  sun. 


The  Feast  of  September  421 

increasingly  probable  that  here,  as  there,  that  doctrine 
was  delivered  in  a  M}'stery.  The  final  proof  there- 
fore of  what  we  have  hitherto  ventured  to  assume 
comes  clearl)-  into  view.  If  the  ritual  marriage 
practised  at  San  Piero  was  what  we  have  supposed  it 
— the  Tuscan  form  of  the  corresponding  rite  at 
Eleusis — then,  in  its  deepest  meaning,  it  must,  at 
Florence  too,  have  concerned  the  dead,  and  taught  a 
hope  of  life  beyond  the  grave.  If  it  can  be  shown 
that  this  was  so,  then  there  is  no  more  doubt ;  the 
Mysteries  of  Demeter  and  of  Bacchus  are  indeed  here  ; 
not  in  accidental  resemblances  only,  but  in  their 
essence  and  spirit  as  well.  We  must  now  appeal  to 
a  single  detail,  but  it  is  one  which,  if  it  have  sense  at 
all,  cannot  but  be  conclusive. 

The  Bishop  of  Florence  on  his  way  to  become  a 
bridegroom  at  San  Piero,  moved  thither  attended 
by  a  bodyguard,  which  by  ancient  right  was  ever 
recruited  from  among  the  men  of  one  family  only,  the 
Delia  Tosa.  These  Visdomini,  or  '  Bishops'  Substi- 
tutes '  as  the  name  means,  held  at  Florence  a  place 
which  may  be  compared  with  that  of  the  Greek 
Eumolpidi  ;  the  family  which  for  twelve  hundred  years 
cherished,  ordered,  and  presided  over  the  Mysteries 
of  Eleusis.  Christianity,  one  supposes,  had  taken 
from  the  Delia  Tosa  the  right  the\'  may  once  have 
had,  of  supplying  Florence  with  her  Hierophants  year 
by  year,  but  something  of  such  a  privilege  remained 
with  them,  and  is  seen  as  they,  receive  and  solemnly 


42  2  Florence  Past  and  Present 

conduct  to  his  '  marriage  '  each  new  Bishop  as  he 
arrives  from  without. 

Like  true  Eumolpids  they  lead  the  procession  still, 
and  are  dressed  for  the  part ;  in  long  robes  that  befit 
the  occasion  and  their  hieratic  character,  and  bearing 
coloured  wands,  red,  white,  and  black,  in  their  hands. 
On  their  heads  are  garlands  of  fresh  flowers,  and  it  is 
these  that  fix  our  attention  while  the  wearers  gather 
about  the  Bishop,  help  him  from  his  palfrey,  lead  him 
into  San  Piero,  and  from  Church  to  Convent,  and  to 
the  privacy  and  repose  he  found  there.  For  the 
garlands  they  wear  are  no  mere  reminiscence  or 
survival  of  pagan  practice ;  the\-  have  a  definite 
doctrinal  meaning,  and  the  doctrine  implied  in  them 
is  that  very  faith  which  so  long  ago  drew  thousands 
to  the  Mysteries  of  Eleusis. 

The  herb  used,  we  are  told,  to  weave  these  crowns 
was  the  pervinca}  the  periwinkle,  with  its  delicately 
fringed  leaves  of  green,  and  large  purplish  blue 
flowers.  Now  t\\Q  pervinca  has  two  alternative  names 
in  Tuscany  ;  it  is  the  Fior  di  Morto,  or  Mortiiic,  and 
the  Manunoloner-  The  last  name  declares  the  mother- 
goddess  we  have  already  found  in  the  Mammola,^ 
and  the  others  proclaim  the  pervinca  as  the  herb 
of  the  dead.  Mattioli,  in  fact,  registers  in  his  Herbal 
the  Tuscan  practice  of  weaving  garlands  of  pciinnca 

'   Laslri,  op.  ciL,  v.  p.  SS. 

-  O.  T,  Tozzetti,  /;/,:;.  Boian.  (1825),  ii.  234. 

"  See  above,  p.  113. 


The  Feast  of  September  423 

for  the  corpses  of  young  people,^  and  Lastri  records 
a  singular  case  of  a  Florentine  woman,  in  whose 
coffin  this  herb  was  found  fresh  and  verdant  after 
many  centuries  of  burial.-  It  was  clearly  the  local 
'  immortelle.' 

Now  there  is  one  explanation,  and  one  only,  which 
accounts  in  a  natural  way  for  the  use  of  this  herb  to 
crown  those  that  led  the  Bishop  to  San  Piero.  The 
occasion  in  itself  was  all  jo}'ful  ;  why  this  flower  of 
the  dead  ?  The  Delia  Tosa,  who  wore  it,  were  the 
Paranymphs,  leading  the  Bishop  to  his  Bridal 
chamber  ;  why  were  they  crov/ned  as  for  the  tomb  ? 
There  can  be  only  one  answer  ;  the  ceremony  holds 
more  than  it  shows  at  first  sight.  In  this  flower  a 
long  past  declares  itself  The  corn- mother  is  here, 
the  Mammolona,  the  great  mother  or  Mater  Magna, 
as  Demeter  was  at  Eleusis.  She  is  here  to  meet  her 
bridegroom,  and  of  that  marriage  hope  is  born,  not 
only  as  men  in  the  clear  September  cast  corn  in  the 
earth,  but  as  they  think  of  the  dead  they  have  already 
laid  there  ;  the  dead  who  are  not  dead,  but  who  live 
still  while  the  corpse  decays.  We  know  this  was  the 
hope  of  Eleusis  ;  and,  by  these  crowns  she  wove  for 
this  marriage,  Florence  held  it  too,  and  confessed  it 
on  a  like  occasion.  The  lights  of  the  Ficrucolone 
gain  a  new  sense  here  ;  they  are  no  mere  accompani- 
ment of  a  rite,  however  jo\'ous  ;  they  are  definitel}' 
the    Rificolone,    as     the    Florentines    still     call     the 

^   Comni.  in  Dioscor.  (1558),  p.  4S7.  -   Op.  cit.,  vi.  201-2. 


424  Florence  Past  and  Present 

September  feast  ;  lights  put  out  only  to  be  kindled 
again  ;  as  it  were  the  soul  breaking  out  to  immortality 
through  the  gates  of  death. 

Fire  has  indeed  a  peculiar  place  in  this  doctrine  ; 
and  one  which,  for  all  our  care,  we  have  not  yet  fully 
exhausted.  It  is  the  force  of  the  subterranean  sun, 
the  glory  of  Dionysus,  felt  in  the  genial  heat  of  the 
earth,  where  it  brings  forth  fruit  of  every  kind,  and 
whence  it  issues  in  streams  and  fountains,  whose 
Avater — sometimes  evidently  igneous — was  supposed 
the  constant  vehicle  of  that  bright  energy. 

Those  that  believed  this  doctrine  could  not  but 
find  a  new  sacredness  and  wonder  in  the  tree.  Early 
and  successful  attempts  at  fire-making,  with  wood 
a.lone,  had  shown  that  fire  lived  in  the  tree  no  less 
than  in  the  stone  ;  and  the  bird  was  hailed  as  the 
messenger  that  lodged  this  power  of  the  sun  in  the 
wood.  But,  evidently,  what  the  bird  did  directly  by 
flying  down,  the  water  did  indirectly  by  rising  from 
beneath.  If  this  element  was  the  vehicle  of  the 
hidden  fire,  it  was  even  more  surely  that  which  every 
tree  drank  through  its  roots.^  Hence  a  peculiar  rever- 
ence paid  to  remarkable  trees  whose  roots  enclose 
a  natural  spring,  and  whose  branches  overarch  it. 
Such  is  the  well  of  St.  Keyne  in  Cornwall,-  and  such 
the   spring  which  a  mighty  ilex  shadows  still  under 

'   Pliny,  N.H.,  xvii.  2. 

-  M.  A.  Courtney,  Cornish  Fcasls  (1890),  p.  64.  For  a  very 
significant  Roman  case,  where  the  tree,  the  fire  and  the  water  appear 
together,  see  Pliny,  N.fL,  ii.  10. 


The  Feast  of  September 


425 


the  hill  of  Monte  Murlo  near  Prato  :  it  is  said  to  have 
risen  in  a  miracle  when  the  tree  was  first  planted. 

The  tree  thus  appeared  as  a  meeting  place  of  the 
midday  and  the  midnight  sun  ;  its  boughs  sheltered 


ILEX   AND    SACRED    WELL    NEAR    MO.NTE    MURLO 


the  winged  messengers  of  the  former,  its  roots  drank 
the  fires  of  the  other,  conveyed  from  beneath  in  the 
rise  of  subterranean  waters  :  its  fruit  was  the 
result  of  both.     This  is  the  doctrine  of  Empedocles, 


426  Florence  Past  and  Present 

who  said  trees  grew  at  first  by  the  internal  heat  laid 
up  in  the  earth  ;  that  when,  thereafter,  the  path  of 
the  sun  was  laid,  day  divided  from  night,  and  man 
from  woman,  trees  began  to  bring  forth  fruit  by  the 
mingled  power  in  them  of  fire  and  water.^  What 
the  doctrine  comes  to  is  that  the  tree  is  a  true  solis 
fncina,  the  meeting  place  of  the  upper  with  the  under 
fires.  The  natural  symbol  of  this  belief  was  the 
column,  where  the  substance  of  the  stone,  itself  the 
home  of  fire,  was  brought  to  \\\q  form  of  the  tree, 
where  the  same  fire  was  believed  to  dwell  in  a 
marriage  of  heaven  and  earth,  and  therefore  with 
double  efficacy. 

Now  the  market  in  front  of  San  Piero  had  just 
such  a  pillar,  which  must  have  meant  much 
more  than  the  mere  occurrence  here  of  the 
ancient  cojiipititm.  Let  us  see  what  part  this  pillar 
plays  in  an  ecclesiastical  ceremonial  which  so 
evidently  repeats  that  of  a  pagan  mystery.  Helped 
by  the  Delia  Tosa,  the  Bishop  alights  from  his  palfrey  ;. 
but  he  is  not  allowed  to  set  foot  on  the  ground  ; 
he  steps  on  the  stump  of  the  column  itself;  an  act 
which  so  surely  and  constantly  made  part  of  the  rite 
that  the  stone  which  received  his  foot  was  known 
in  Florence  as  '  la  stafifa  del  Vescovo '  :  the  Bishop's 
stirrup.-  It  would  seem,  indeed,  that  he  was  to 
be    carefulh-    kept    from    contact    with    the  soil.      In 

'   (Quoted  hy  I'lutarch,  De  placit.  phil.,  v.  26. 
'■^  Lnslri,  op.  cit. ,  v.  p.  89. 


The  Feast  of  September  427 

1567  he  mereh'  used  the  pillar  as  a  stepping- 
off  stone,  but  in  1286  the  rite  retained  more  of  the 
past.  The  Delia  Tosa  then  '  received  him  in  their 
arms,  and  went  with  him  to  the  altar  .  .  .  and 
thereafter,  when  he  would  withdraw  himself,  they  still 
accompanied  him,  holding  him  in  their  arms  ;  that  is, 
helping  to  carry  him,  and  went  with  him  even  to  the 
bed-chamber.'  ^  One  step  more  in  such  retrogression 
and  it  is  clear  what  we  should  find.  The  feet  that 
had  touched  the  column  must  not  be  profaned  by 
any  contact  with  the  earth  till  the  whole  ceremony  is 
over.  Significant  indeed  is  the  sudden  change  the 
next  day  brings.  He  who  had  ridden  to  the  Church 
now  walks  thence  to  the  Geniculum  ;  he  who  had 
been  carried  in  his  attendants'  arms,  walks  barefoot ; 
for  now  the  great  Mysteries  are  over,  and  only 
the  lesser  left. 

The  marriage  at  San  Piero,  if  we  have  read  the  signs 
aright,  would  thus  represent,  ritually  and  symbolically, 
the  union  of  heaven  and  earth,  of  fire  and  water,  in  the 
tree.  The  pagan  Hierophant,  whom  the  Bishop  had 
come  to  supplant,  moved  to  the  copipitiim  that  in  a 
mystery  he  might  represent  the  Dion}\sus,  the  god 
who  was  the  hidden  fire.  He  himself  becomes 
charged — as  from  an  electric  conductor — when  he 
touches  the  tree,  and  thenceforth  must  be  treated  as 
the  god  in  person  till  the  mystery  is  complete  ;  borne 

^  BuUettoue,  quoted  in  A.  Cocchi,  Chicse  di  Fireitze  (1903), 
p.  103. 


428  Florence  Past  and  Present 

up  above  the  earth  lest  the  Genius,  the  new 
personaHty  revealed  in  this  place  and  rite,  depart 
from  him,  and  the  mystic  marriage  lose  its  highest 
significance  and  effect.  It  is  well  known  that  such 
precautions  have  been,  and  still  are,  taken  in  the  rites 
of  many  different  nations.^ 


Thus  we  have  returned — after  how  many  journeys 
in  how  many  different  directions — to  the  place  which 
seems  to  have  been  the  principal  and  most  ancient 
seat  of  Florentine  religion  ;  as  the  line  in  which  it 
stood  was  that  along  which  Florence  moved  west- 
ward to  her  later  centre  and  splendid  development. 
More  :  for  we  have  come  to  find  there  that  which  is 
truly  original  and  central  in  the  city  of  the  soul  ;  that 
salt  without  which  no  religion  can  long  survive  ;  the 
hope  of  eternal  life.  Had  it  been  only  the  corn  men 
thought  of  when  they  gathered  of  old  in  the 
Mercatino,  a  few  bad  years  had  seen  the  end  of  that 

'  For  examples  consult  Frazer,  Golden  Boii^li,  iii.  pp.  202,  464,  etc. 


The  Feast  of  September  429 

September  feast.  The  Mystery  rather  concerned  the 
dead  ;  and  such  hope  of  Hfe  did  it  inspire  that,  age 
after  age,  the  promise  of  eternity  it  held  out  gave 
permanence  to  the  rite  itself  So  it  endured,  as 
all  must  which  is  substantial  truth — even  though 
confused  in  surrounding  falsehood — till  the  day  when 
the  Truth  Himself  appeared  to  abolish  Death  and 
bring  Life  and  Immortality  to  light  in  the  good 
news  of  His  Resurrection. 


LAUS   DEO. 


INDEX 


Abundantia,    1 10,  113,  307,  367, 

382. 

Abundia,  307. 

Acorns  as  food,  22. 

Adonis,  345,  347,  349. 

-^gaean  brooch,  72,  74,   131,   151, 

420. 
Aes  rude,  132. 
Aes  si^^na/um,  ix,  48  n. 
Affrico,  river,  108,  125-6,  407. 
Agriculture,  early,  102-4,  i35-9- 
Agrimensores,  106-8,  347. 
Alphabet,  discovery  ot  the,  52-3. 
Altafronte,  82-3. 
Ambrogiana,  the,  193,  205. 
Amiata,  Monte,  5. 
Amphitheatre,  the,  73,  152. 
Anagoge  at  Eryx,  346. 
Anapauonienos,  387. 
Ani,  119,  278,  409. 
Antella,  55,  221,  417-18. 
Apennine,  the,  3-4,   15,  40,  49,   53, 

55,  105,  216. 
Aplu,  Usil,  121,  131-2,  377  n. 
Apparita  pass,  55. 
Arcetri,  69. 

Arezzo,  4-5,  6,  53,  129,  131,  197-8. 
Argiano,  51. 
Arista,  the,  405-6. 
Arna,  the    goddess,  295,  343,  365, 

370,  383.  392,  405- 
Arnaccio,  the,  201. 
Arnina,   Villa,    103,    107,  119,   125, 

138-42,   342,   344,  351,  365,  370, 

382,  391-2. 
Amine,  river,  342-3. 
Aroanius,  river,  294-5. 
Artimino,  51,  68. 
Ascension  d-iy,  352-60,  406. 
Assassins,  the,  310.-' 
Ass  of  Empoli,  327-8, 
Atargatis,  344,  367,  374. 


'Atheh,  344,  372. 
Attis,  338,  340,  345. 
Aulla,  5. 

Bacchus,  384-5,  388,  404-5,  412, 

419. 
Badia  all'  Isola  tomb,  52-3. 

of  Fiesole,  64. 

Baptistery,    the,     no     ?i.,     382-3, 

386. 
Barat  of  Kumaon,  327-8. 
Bathing,  ceremonial,  391. 
Beans  as  a  prophylactic,  304-6. 
Beccola,  212-13,  225. 
Becolino,  the,  212-13,  225. 
Befana,  289-90,  293,  300-13,  316. 
Bellariva,  172. 
Bellosguardo,  69,  81. 
Birds,  sacred,  424. 
Bisarni,  67. 
Bisenzio,  201,  218. 
Bishop's  progress,  1 16-17. 
Boccaccio,  285. 
Bocca  d'Arno,  220. 
Boedromion ,  407. 
Borghi,  the,  81. 
Borgo  vS  Jacopo,  81,  174. 

S.  Piero,  114,  330  «. 

Borgunto,  55,  69,70,  73,  75,  78,  93, 

no,  126,  129,  139. 
Bridges,  228-31. 
Brindellone,  371-2. 
Brunellesco,  194. 
Biillettone,     the,     1 16-17,    4^5    "•> 

427. 
Buti,  295. 

Caduceus,  the,  377  ;/. 
Cakes,  ritual,  349,  366,  368  ?i. 
Calcinaia,  201. 
Calcisfriizzo,  162. 
Calimara,  Via,  146. 

431 


432 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


Callicantzari ,  287-8,  291,  299,  300, 
_  302,  304,  306. 
Camaldoli,  215,  217. 
Caniarte,  Villa,  103,   107,  119,   125, 

138-40,  351.  382,  386,  3902. 
Camerata,  69. 
Camorra,  the,  x. 
Campagna   of  Rome,  the,   14,   15, 

86. 
Cancer,  sign  of,  359,  383,  387, 
Candeii,    53,  57,  67,  69,   72-3,  93, 

129,  139-40,  149,  152,  231. 
Canto  dei  Pazzi,  320,  330. 
Caravan,  the,  98-9,  loi. 
Carbonari  a,  346. 
Cardea,  the  goddess,  276,  280. 
Cardo,  the,  146,  149-50,  153. 
Carp,  178,  180. 
Carradora,  280. 
Carradore,  238. 
Casaglia,  pass  of,  53,  55,  70. 
Castelfranco,  lygn.,  198. 
Castellina  in  Chianti,  51,  56  ;/. 
Celiaula,  381. 
Centaurs,  288,  296,  299. 
Chestnuts  as  food,  23-6. 
Chiana,  the,  4-5,  196-7. 
Chianti,  6,  70. 
Chiusi,  196-7. 
Cimarnta ,  the,  270. 
Ciminian  forest,  15. 
Cippi,  131,  420. 
Cippus  of  S.  Tommaso,  121,  131-2, 

377  n. ,  420. 
Cirauli,  the,  381. 

Clothes,  spell  of  boiling,  29,  30,  32. 
Colle,  tomb  at,  51-3,  72. 
Colotnbina,    the,    319,    324,    336-8, 

345-. 
Compita,   109-10,   113-16,  118,    122, 

126,  145,  149,  290,  330,  403,  409, 

411,  426. 
Compitalia,  the,   289-92,   299,   302, 
,  306. 
Consivus,  Janus,  412. 
Convents,  early,  104-6. 
Copper,  132-3. 
Coriata,  the,  407. 
Corpus  Domini  day,  327,  337. 
Cortona,  196. 
Cretan  goddess,  369-70. 
Custonaci,  Madonna  of,  294  >i. 
Cybele,  338-46. 
Cyprus,  131,  133. 


Dalmatian  Yule,  291. 

Dante,  94. 

Da  Vinci,  Leonardo,  193,  213. 

Dead,  the,  287,  292-3,  305,  418-29. 

Dea  Syria,  the,  367 

Decnmanus,  the,   146-50,   153,  320, 

330-1,   339  «•.  341-2"  348-9,  351, 

392-3- 
Delia   Tosa  family,  414,   416,  421, 

423,  426-7. 
Demeter,    293-6,    299,    302,    306-7, 

311,  406,  413,  417-18,  423. 
Dialect,  90,  171. 
Diana,  119  ;«.,  299,  306. 
Dionysus,  384,  406,  412,  419,  424, 

427. 
Dodona,  oracle  of,  337,  387. 
Doves,    sacred,    324,    336-7,     346, 

350. 
Duomo,  the,  194-5. 

Eels,  179. 

Eleusis,  407-8,  412,  416-17,  421-3. 
Empoli,  201,  205,  220,  327. 
Engineering,  early,  137-40. 
Envoiltement,  spell  of,  33. 
Equinoxes,  the,  316,  329,  331,  338, 

341-3.  349.  404.  406. 
Eryx,  294-6,  346. 
Etruscans,  the,  127-53. 

Fasting,  26  8. 

Fattura  della  Morte,  32-3. 

Fiesole,  53,  55,  63,  69,  129,  137-52, 

162,  221,  369. 
Flora,  river,  343. 
Fire,    prophylactic,    288,    301,    303, 

307- 
birds,  332,  335,  337,  346,  349- 

50- 

■  cars,  317-23,  361-2,  371,  392. 

making,  276,  328-9,  331,  424. 

Fishers  and  hunters,  13  20,  22,  26-8, 

32-4,    36-41,    45-6,    50,   57.    85-8, 

89-93,  96,  98-100,  189,  214,  226, 

271,  308-13,  351. 
Flexible  axe,  310. 
Flora,  295,  343-4- 
Florentia  in  Spain,  344. 
Fonterutoli,  56  v. 
Footprint,  magic,  30-2. 
Fortuna,  113,  145,  149,  291-3,  343-5, 

351.  364-5.  367-70,  372,  374.  377, 

381-4,  405,  410. 


Index 


4jo 


Frizzo,  the,  95-6,  400,  402,  408. 
Fucecchio,  52,  131,  161,  211. 
Futa  pass,  70-2. 

Gavtbriniis  tombs,  71-2,  108,  151. 
Gardens  of  Adonis,  349. 
Gates  of  the  Sun,  292,  359. 
Geniculum,    117,   119-20,   409,  411, 

415.  427- 
Genita  Mana,  290. 
Ge?tiiis,   the,   134-5,    142,   219,   227, 

409,  411-12,  419,  427. 
Gergo,  the,  212-13,  291-2. 
Gigho  of  Florence,  389-90,  392,  417- 

18,  420. 
Girone,    the,    6,    11,   47-S,   53,    60, 

139- 
Glazing  of  pottery,  188-9. 
Golfolina,  6,  10,  51,   53,   57,  60,  67, 

137-8,  139-40,  201,  213-14,  220. 
Gondolas,  190. 
Gorge,    or  Gorgo,  43,    46,    53,    67, 

108  «.,  219,  227,  393,  407. 
Gorgon,  the,  369-70. 
Granada,  344. 
Greece   and    Greeks    at    Florence, 

i-^,  X.  53-4.  72,  287,  303,  305,  308, 

310-11,    337-8,    346-7,    362,    377, 

407. 
Grillo,  the,  357-60,  394. 

Helios,  364,  366,  393. 

Hercules,  372-4,  381,  387,  390,  405, 

409-10,  419. 
Herodias,  307. 
Hestia,  223. 
Hilaria,  338,  340,  348. 
Homoeopathic  magic,  32-6. 
Horse,  the,  41,  250,  256. 
Hunters  and  fishers,  13-20,  22,  26-8, 

32-4,   36-41,  45-6,  50,   57,    85-93, 

96,    98-100,    189,   214,    226,    27  c, 

308-13,  351. 

Immortality,  418-29. 
Istia,  161,  224. 

Janus,  118-19,   134,  142,276,  278, 

339  «.,  409-12. 
Jettatiira,  30,  274. 
Juno,  409-10,  412. 
Jupiter  Lapis,  335. 


Kore,  407. 


Kronia,  the,  362-3. 
Kronos,  363,  366-7,  388. 

Lakes,  former,  6-1 1,  47,  60,  137-8. 

La  Mula,  tomb  at,  78,  151-2. 

Language,  89-96. 

Larella,  the,  292. 

Lari.  285-6. 

Lares,  286-7,  289-90,  292. 

Larva,  290. 

Latiuni,  14-16,  37-8,40,91,  93,  102. 

Laitone,  the,  357  71. 

Leghorn,  220. 

Liber  Pater,  42,  385. 

Lilybaeum,  295. 

Limite,  202-12,  222. 

Lions,  sacred,  373-4,  377,  420. 

Lombardy,  15-16,  37-8,  40,  71,  91, 

93,  98,  lOI. 
Lotos,  the,  388-9,  391,  418-19. 
Loup  garoii,  311. 
Lucca,  5. 

L21CUS  Furrinae,  367. 
Lupercalia,  311. 
Lupo  mainiaro,  34-6.  287-8,  290,  311. 

Madnkss,  magic  of,  vii-ix,  36. 
Madonna  della  Tromba,   114,   300, 

307- 

del  Sasso,  341. 

Magic,  26-36,  268-9. 

Magra  river,  4-5. 

ALimmola,  113,  422. 

Mania,  290-3,  299,  302,  307,  316. 

Maniac,  290,  307. 

Manies,  307. 

Mannar  a,  291. 

Marcignana,  198. 

Maremma,  the,  41. 

Markets,  81. 

Marricige,  ritual,  124,  413-28. 

Mars,  381-3,  385,  390,  392. 

Marsi,  the,  381. 

Marzocco,  373-4.  377  "•.  389.  390. 

392- 
Masking,  3035,  308-13. 
^L^starna,  365,  381. 
Mater  Magna,  the,  343,  423. 
Matriarchate,  99-100,  104,  113,  123, 

136. 
Melcarth,  372-3. 
Mercatino,  115,  118,  126,  141-3,  146, 

152,  403. 
Mercato  .Vuovo,  149. 


2  E 


434 


Florence  Past  and  Present 


Mercato  Vecchio,   no,   126,    141-3, 

145-6,  152. 
Midnight    sun,    385-92,    405,    412, 

417-19,  421. 
Milky  VVay,  360. 
Montelupo,  6,  10,  193,  201,  205. 
Monte  Morello,  70,  75. 
Monte  Murlo,  29,  425. 
Montepiano,  218. 
Montepulciano,  196. 
Mother-goddess,  113,  122. 
Mugello,  70-1. 
Mugnone   river,    63-4,    67-9,    71-2, 

108,  125-6,  129,  144,  146,  198, 
Murviedro,  55. 
Mut,  the  goddess,  261  n. 
Mycenae,  78,  132,  151. 
Mysteries,  the,  311,  407-8,  412,  419, 

421. 

Nave,  the,  228. 

Naviglio,  202. 

Netting-needle,  177. 

New  Year  at    Florence,    316,    338, 

342,  551- 
Nile,  the,  307-9. 

Nipotecosa  family,  104,  114,  123. 
Noise,  prophylactic,  289,  299,  501, 

303.  307- 
Normans  on  Arno,  195. 
Nortia,  goddess,  291-2,  344,  365. 
Nth  language,  54-6,  74,  151. 

Oak  of  Signa,  29. 

Ocrisia,  289. 

Oxen,  40,  250,  318,  348. 

Pack-horse,  the,  41,  143. 

Parsimony,  Florentine,  20-2. 

Pazzi,  the,  320,  330  11. 

Palazzi  of  Florence,  86-7. 

Palio,  the,  236,  392-4. 

Fedga  taja  magic,  30-2. 

Phigalia,  293,  295. 

Piagentina,  172. 

Piazza  dell'  Arno  or  delle  Travi,  70, 

73-5.  103,  107,  134,  140-r,  214. 
Picchiotti,  the,  206-12,  222. 
Pinti,  70,  73,  115,  T50,  152. 
Pisa,  4,  6,  49,  71,  190,  194,  196,  202, 

220. 
Pistoia,  6,  51. 

Po  valley,  13,  50,  70,  86,  137. 
Poison  in  fish,  180. 


Pontassieve,  5-6,  10. 

Ponte  Vecchio,   81,    139,   149,   152, 

213,  231. 
Porcac,  406,  417. 
Pork  as  a  bait,  291. 
Porticella  di  fodari,  214  «. 
Poseidon,  294-6,  302,  306  ;/.,  393. 
Pozzo  della  Botta,  218. 
Pratovecchio,  216-7. 
Premilcore,  373. 
Prometheus,  332  /;. 
Proserpine,  290-1,  293,  406-7. 
Proverbs,  88-9. 
Psophis,  294-5. 
Pyramid,  329. 
Pyre  of  Hierapolis,  345. 

QuiNTO,  71,  78,  151-2. 

Rad5dese,  307. 
Reeds,  13,  205,  257,  260. 
Renaissance,  xii,  133-4. 
Rhea,  339,  386. 
Rhombus,  311. 
Ritual  flight,  the,  120. 
Roads,  41-8,  51,  etc. 
Ronta,  55. 
Rue,  279. 
Rutuli,  the,  56  ;/. 

Saguntum,  55,  294. 

Sahara  trade,  53. 

SS.  Apostoli  Church,  317,  320. 

S.  Elias,  364. 

S.  Giorgio,  hill  of,  67,  69,  71-2,  81, 

138.  ^ 
S.  Giovanni  alia  \'^ena,  296,  300. 
S.  Gorgone,  219,  227,  370. 
S.  Nicholas,  302. 
S.  Peter  of  Verona,  299  w.,  300. 
S.   Piero  Maggiore,  Church  of,  24, 

115-20,  124,  403,  409,  411,  413-14, 

416-17,  421,  426-7. 
S.  Reparata,  360,  364. 
S.   Toinmaso,   Church  and  cipptis, 

121,  131-2,  377  n.,  420. 
S.  Trinita,  Church,  Piazza,  colunm, 

and  bridge,  64,  193. 
S.  Verdiana,  370,  378,  381. 
Sa?tta  Clans,  302. 
Sawing  the  old  ■woman  ,315 
Scala,  the,  314-15. 
Se»ii,  182. 
Serchio,  river,  4-5. 


Ind 


ex 


435 


Servius  Tullius,  289,  291-2,  365. 
Sesto    road,    71-8,    81,    no,     122, 

126. 
Sewi7tg  clothes,  348. 
Sieve,  river,  4-6. 
Signa,  6,  10,  29,   63,   193,  201,  218, 

231.  335-7- 
Sminthius,  y^  n. 
Snakes,  sacreii,  366,  368,  377,  383, 

385.  410. 
Solstices,  331,  359-63,  383,  386,  404, 

406. 
Soma,  the,  253,  256. 
Sosipolis,  366-7. 
Spain,  55. 
Spina,  ix. 

Spirits,  wood  and  water,  28-9. 
Springs,  sacred,  387,  390,  424-5. 
Stock  and  stone,   sacred,   122,    136, 

276-7,  329,  331,  335,  337. 
Straw-plait,  205,  265. 
Strozzi,  the,  414,  416. 
Sun  worship,  106,  T19,  121-2. 
Superstition,  26-36. 
Sympathetic  magic,  29-32. 

Tarsus,  god  of,  377,  389,  418. 
Theodoric,  195. 
Terramare,  the,  347. 
Thezli,  coins  of,  369. 
Tiber,  the,  4,  14-15,  71. 
Timber  trade,  134-5,  214  n. 
Torre  Lunga,  the,  205. 
Totemism,  27,  309-11. 
Trade  guilds,  170. 
Trees,  sacred,  29,   109,   T13,  122-3, 
424-6. 


Ugnano,  198. 
Uni,  278,  409. 
Usil-Aplu,  121,  131-2,  377  11. 

Vallombros.\,  218. 
Vampires,  287-8,  305  ;/.,  306. 
Varlungo,  163. 

Venus,  293-5,  296  n.,  299  11.,  345. 
Verruca,  295-6,  299. 
Ver  iacrum,  the,  378  n . 
Vesta,  223-4. 
Via  dei  Bardi,  82. 

Gentilis,  116,  411. 

Sacra,  107,  121-2,  124-6,  140-1, 

146,  149,  411. 
Villa   Arnina,    103,    107,    119,    125, 

138--J2,  342,   344,    351,   365,  370, 

382,  39T-2. 
Camarte,  103, 107, 119, 125, 138- 

.40.  351.  382,  386,  390-2. 
Villanova,  70-2,  78,  151. 
Visdomini,  the,  414,  416,  421. 
Volcanoes,  4-5. 
Voherra,  6,  29. 

Wedding  of  waters,  197. 
Were-wolves,      34-6,      287-8,      290, 

311- 
Wheel-traffic,  143-6,  152,  244,  249. 
Wine-fiasks,  205,  242-3,  256-7. 
Witches,  29,  32,  265-6,  306-7. 
Woodpecker,  332,  337. 

Zacvnthl's,  54-5,  294,  306  n. 
Zeus,  332,  335,  337-8. 
Zodiac  in  pavement,  383. 
Ziicca  da  Sale.  182. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


MAY  2  -  1957 


'  LD 

JUN  k    1965 


AM 
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URl 


Form  L9-2r)»(-9,'47(A5618)444 


:IVED 

URL 


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f .  {5AR  ..S 


367        ,m 

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i^*IWN  1  b  19*) 


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M  '  3197B 


%\'  9  1977 

JAN  0  D  198\ 

REC'D  IDURC 

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UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACIUTY 


AA    001  116  367    2 


